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Those "news" (commercials in disguise) about d2 consistently fail to make it clear that even though the language itself is opensource, the primary backend for i

Those "news" (commercials in disguise) about d2 consistently fail to make it clear that even though the language itself is opensource, the primary backend for it isn't, and is actually quite expensive. There're free backends, but those have inferior capabilities.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
wiradikusuma 3y ago
I can't seem to find the pricing page?
- afruitpie 3y ago
  The proprietary layout engine is named TALA. IMO the docs are pretty transparent about TALA being closed source and behind a paywall. TALA docs: https://d2lang.com/tour/tala/ https://d2lang.com/tour/tala/ TALA product page: https://terrastruct.com/tala/ https://terrastruct.com/tala/
  - weare138 3y ago
    TALA is a separate install from D2, to keep a clean cut between 100% free and open-source D2, and proprietary, closed-source TALA. It seems the 2 are distributed separately and D2 supports open-source layout engines also.
smusamashah 3y ago
Pikchr https://pikchr.org/home/pikchrshow https://pikchr.org/home/pikchrshow is the other general purpose one and older than d2. It is "Source-Code License: 0-clause BSD" as it says on the page.
alixanderwang 3y ago
I'm not sure where you got the impression that the paid layout engine is the primary backend for it. We set out to make our own layout engine, which we charge for, true. However to say it outcompetes the efforts of all open-source ones including ones used by Graphviz (dagre) and university researchers (ELK) is quite the compliment, and not one that we've ever made ourselves. There are simply different use cases for each: https://d2lang.com/tour/layouts https://d2lang.com/tour/layouts . In fact we specifically de-weight our own layout engine, making it a separate install and not referenced anywhere in the D2 project. The vast majority of D2 users aren't paying a penny. And like another comment says, we make it abundantly clear our own layout engine is not open-source everywhere that it's mentioned. Your claim that this is a commercial post is also unfounded. I opened HN today as a reader and was surprised to see this post.
- Mikhail_K 3y ago
  > I'm not sure where you got the impression that the paid layout engine is the primary backend for it. I got this impression once I failed to reproduce the examples in your documentation with free backend. > However to say it outcompetes the efforts of all open-source ones including ones used by > Graphviz (dagre) and university researchers (ELK) is quite the compliment, I did not mean to say that your engine outcompetes the open-source ones, but rather that d2 gives inferior results with them. > Your claim that this is a commercial post is also unfounded. I keep seeing thinly disguised d2 promos on the front page and this raises a few questions. This is fairly niche product, and far from unique in its capabilities. Why would it keep showing up among highest-ranked posts?
  - alixanderwang 3y ago
    > I got this impression once I failed to reproduce the examples in your documentation with free backend. This is easily verifiably false. All the examples have direct links to the playground to reproduce, except the few explicitly called out in the layout section as belonging to TALA's. If you still claim this, simply provide a link to an example that doesn't explicitly say it's made with TALA in the docs (d2lang.com). > I did not mean to say that your engine outcompetes the open-source ones, but rather that d2 gives inferior results with them. I'm not sure you understand the role layout engines have. All languages like PlantUML etc just abstractly represent nodes and connections and choose some styles for them. The rest is layout engine. > Why would it keep showing up among highest-ranked posts? You're engaging in conspiracy theories and there's nothing further I can prove short of an HN mod telling you these are legitimate unrelated posters and upvoters.
- junon 3y ago
  Isn't dagre dead,though?
  - alixanderwang 3y ago
    It was unmaintained for a long time (maybe considered done implementing the algorithm it set out to), but recently a Google engineer has revived it: https://github.com/dagrejs/dagre https://github.com/dagrejs/dagre
CamperBob2 3y ago
Also, it won't be long before ChatGPT or similar models will do the same thing. A specialized text-to-diagram generator is a pointless thing to work on, IMHO, except for the fun of it.
- Veuxdo 3y ago
  I think it will be long time before ChatGPT can make system diagrams of real systems. It can make a plausible diagram of a fake system, but that's basically worthless.
- wizzwizz4 3y ago
  You might as well say that, because of the telephone, we will no longer need sound. I think you misunderstand how ChatGPT generates images. ChatGPT can only generate text: somebody at OpenAI wrote additional software to handle images, and connected it up to ChatGPT. (I believe ChatGPT is prompting an image model based on DALL-E, though who really knows what's going on in proprietary SaaSS?) It's not a magic box that, left alone, will inevitably and inexorably transform into the solution to all the world's problems. If ChatGPT is ever capable of producing diagrams, it will be because of systems like this.
  - CamperBob2 3y ago
    We'll see. That's why they call it the "Bitter Lesson." As far as telephones and sound go, it's more like when AutoCAD came along and all of a sudden it was hard to sell T-squares.
    - wizzwizz4 3y ago
      I have no doubt that it's possible to design an algorithm that can produce diagrams in a given style, given a sufficient description. But a GPT is only going to learn that sort of thing via sufficiently-many examples. This problem is fundamentally different to (e.g.) computer chess, in that we have no algorithmic win condition. You can't brute-force a solution space when your only way of assessing whether candidates are any good is to ask a human. (Especially not when humans use heuristics to assess the quality of something at a glance, and find it tiring to process large quantities of data: that's a simple recipe for specification gaming if ever I saw one.)

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

wiradikusuma 3y ago

I can't seem to find the pricing page?

afruitpie 3y ago
The proprietary layout engine is named TALA. IMO the docs are pretty transparent about TALA being closed source and behind a paywall. TALA docs: https://d2lang.com/tour/tala/ https://d2lang.com/tour/tala/ TALA product page: https://terrastruct.com/tala/ https://terrastruct.com/tala/
- weare138 3y ago
  TALA is a separate install from D2, to keep a clean cut between 100% free and open-source D2, and proprietary, closed-source TALA. It seems the 2 are distributed separately and D2 supports open-source layout engines also.

smusamashah 3y ago

Pikchr https://pikchr.org/home/pikchrshow https://pikchr.org/home/pikchrshow is the other general purpose one and older than d2. It is "Source-Code License: 0-clause BSD" as it says on the page.

alixanderwang 3y ago

I'm not sure where you got the impression that the paid layout engine is the primary backend for it. We set out to make our own layout engine, which we charge for, true. However to say it outcompetes the efforts of all open-source ones including ones used by Graphviz (dagre) and university researchers (ELK) is quite the compliment, and not one that we've ever made ourselves. There are simply different use cases for each: https://d2lang.com/tour/layouts https://d2lang.com/tour/layouts . In fact we specifically de-weight our own layout engine, making it a separate install and not referenced anywhere in the D2 project. The vast majority of D2 users aren't paying a penny. And like another comment says, we make it abundantly clear our own layout engine is not open-source everywhere that it's mentioned. Your claim that this is a commercial post is also unfounded. I opened HN today as a reader and was surprised to see this post.

Mikhail_K 3y ago
> I'm not sure where you got the impression that the paid layout engine is the primary backend for it. I got this impression once I failed to reproduce the examples in your documentation with free backend. > However to say it outcompetes the efforts of all open-source ones including ones used by > Graphviz (dagre) and university researchers (ELK) is quite the compliment, I did not mean to say that your engine outcompetes the open-source ones, but rather that d2 gives inferior results with them. > Your claim that this is a commercial post is also unfounded. I keep seeing thinly disguised d2 promos on the front page and this raises a few questions. This is fairly niche product, and far from unique in its capabilities. Why would it keep showing up among highest-ranked posts?
- alixanderwang 3y ago
  > I got this impression once I failed to reproduce the examples in your documentation with free backend. This is easily verifiably false. All the examples have direct links to the playground to reproduce, except the few explicitly called out in the layout section as belonging to TALA's. If you still claim this, simply provide a link to an example that doesn't explicitly say it's made with TALA in the docs (d2lang.com). > I did not mean to say that your engine outcompetes the open-source ones, but rather that d2 gives inferior results with them. I'm not sure you understand the role layout engines have. All languages like PlantUML etc just abstractly represent nodes and connections and choose some styles for them. The rest is layout engine. > Why would it keep showing up among highest-ranked posts? You're engaging in conspiracy theories and there's nothing further I can prove short of an HN mod telling you these are legitimate unrelated posters and upvoters.
junon 3y ago
Isn't dagre dead,though?
- alixanderwang 3y ago
  It was unmaintained for a long time (maybe considered done implementing the algorithm it set out to), but recently a Google engineer has revived it: https://github.com/dagrejs/dagre https://github.com/dagrejs/dagre

CamperBob2 3y ago

Also, it won't be long before ChatGPT or similar models will do the same thing. A specialized text-to-diagram generator is a pointless thing to work on, IMHO, except for the fun of it.

Veuxdo 3y ago
I think it will be long time before ChatGPT can make system diagrams of real systems. It can make a plausible diagram of a fake system, but that's basically worthless.
wizzwizz4 3y ago
You might as well say that, because of the telephone, we will no longer need sound. I think you misunderstand how ChatGPT generates images. ChatGPT can only generate text: somebody at OpenAI wrote additional software to handle images, and connected it up to ChatGPT. (I believe ChatGPT is prompting an image model based on DALL-E, though who really knows what's going on in proprietary SaaSS?) It's not a magic box that, left alone, will inevitably and inexorably transform into the solution to all the world's problems. If ChatGPT is ever capable of producing diagrams, it will be because of systems like this.
- CamperBob2 3y ago
  We'll see. That's why they call it the "Bitter Lesson." As far as telephones and sound go, it's more like when AutoCAD came along and all of a sudden it was hard to sell T-squares.
  - wizzwizz4 3y ago
    I have no doubt that it's possible to design an algorithm that can produce diagrams in a given style, given a sufficient description. But a GPT is only going to learn that sort of thing via sufficiently-many examples. This problem is fundamentally different to (e.g.) computer chess, in that we have no algorithmic win condition. You can't brute-force a solution space when your only way of assessing whether candidates are any good is to ask a human. (Especially not when humans use heuristics to assess the quality of something at a glance, and find it tiring to process large quantities of data: that's a simple recipe for specification gaming if ever I saw one.)