Great Question Mat, Having read through the reply's so far there are some great comments. Some thoughts on mine on this that may offer another perspective. I was a hobby programmer before I left school, then a professional Analyst/Programmer in my early career, and I have always being a conceptual systems thinker, programming solutions for my whole career.
To me programming is the encoding of algorithms, instructions on a piece of paper are good enough for this, but computer programming uses computers to do so, so yes Tiddlywiki is a platform in which to program or capture algorithms which we can make interactive and includes storage and presentation. Is TiddlyWiki or its Wiki Text a programming language?, I do not think it is a complete language and since it can incorporate JavaScript, and leverages HTML and CSS does it need to would be a valid question. This is in part why I call it a platform. Never the less perhaps there is value in the community ensuring it is a complete programming language of its own, ideally leveraging another language. While it may not be a complete language it has a number of elements that are "high level language" components. The use of filters and lists allow us to define a set which is then iterated for us rather than us writing the code within that. Writing macros and Importing plugins allow use to build or import higher levels of abstract logic, process and interface control objects. TiddlyWiki is a "platform" because it brings together all the essential features needs to encode algorithms including alternative ways to present information/data, a highly customisable user interface, the ability to serve it to a network or the world as well as a basis to build a database, build sophisticated relationships and hierarchies, interact with other resources and websites, import and export almost anything, and unlike most other platforms in this space it can also be self contained, a more than minimal Quine, or simply a stand alone document. Whilst they have being around for a long time in the last decade the Information Technology community has expanded and a new emphasis has being placed on Systems Thinking, Design thinking and UX (user interface). TiddlyWiki is both a playground and a platform through which to exercise both to a high level. Given the TiddlyWiki platform is so versatile I would describe my self as a designer, designing solutions, capturing information and algorithms on the TiddlyWiki platform. Except for people who are unaware of the platform any one who uses TiddlyWiki is likely to be a designer as well. Regards Tony. On Monday, 20 August 2018 21:09:19 UTC+10, Mat wrote: > > What "is" hacking in TW? Is it coding? Is the particular WikiText used in > TW a high level programming language? Or is it just markup? > > ...semi related... > > IRL, I compare TW to building with lego. I master TW pretty well so I say > I can build "anything" with TW analogously to how I can build "anything" > with lego. So is that actually constructing things? Maybe it should be > called "prototyping" even if it's not prototypes? > > <:-) > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TiddlyWiki" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/tiddlywiki. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tiddlywiki/1d981ff9-0520-42b7-91b1-36b09006aa82%40googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
