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Huh? I currently work with some of the technologies you mention, but fail to see the connection to systems theory. Can you elaborate why e.g. jq or Erlang are r

• bordercases 9y ago
  Most of those technologies are known for either how they handle complexity, or the coordination between asynchronous actors with shared resources
  • gaius 9y ago
    Uhhh what? jq is basically an updated sed. One input stream, one output stream, no awareness of anything else
    • joncampbelldev 9y ago
      Perhaps they meant it as a good example of the type of component to build systems out of, simple input->output. Unsure though.
    • JshWright 9y ago
      You don't see how a simple input/output streaming model would be helpful in understanding systems theory and design? There are a _lot_ of systems out there that tie together various components with tools that behave a lot like jq (or literally are jq...)
      • gaius 9y ago
        Yes this is how every Unix command line utility works. There is nothing unique about jq in this regard, and there is nothing particularly “systems thinking” about any of them. You can and people have used them for decades without doing any special “systems thinking”.
        • deleted 9y ago
          [deleted]
        • prepend 9y ago
          The Unix model is really useful in my systems thinking precisely because thousands of components all use the stream in/out approach. This made then reliable within a system to be used together in many different combinations and interactions. Also a good example of loose coupling that allows for good thinking of systems. In school we watched the 1990 movie [MindWalk](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100151/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100151/). You can watch it on YouTube https://youtu.be/Uec1CX-6A38 https://youtu.be/Uec1CX-6A38
        • sheepmullet 9y ago
          > There is nothing unique about jq in this regard Does there have to be? It's simply an example of a good systems pattern/approach.
    • bordercases 9y ago
      I took your "e.g." to mean inclusive of jq and Erlang, but extensive to the entire list. What I said applies to Erlang, OSes, and LISP, but maybe not to jq (I wouldn't know).
• ismail 9y ago
  - There seems to be confusion here. - There is general systems theory [0] and within that systems engineering[1] where you will find software systems [2] - OP is most likely talking about how to use of general theory of systems in different domains and not specifically software systems. - If one considers JQ, SED and "One input stream, one output stream" and then compares that to a model of a system using a CLD (Causal Loop Diagram). A CLD is effectively "An input, followed by an output" - Another word that could be used for "input stream" would be 'flow' from system dynamics [3] - One could apply general systems theory (the abstract concept) to just about anything [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_theory [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_engineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_engineering [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_dynamics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_dynamics
  • amelius 9y ago
    There's also linear system theory, which control theory is related to.