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Machine readable just means a machine can read it. Whether humans can read it as well is irrelevant to the definition. (And there are pretty much no formats th

Machine readable just means a machine can read it. Whether humans can read it as well is irrelevant to the definition. (And there are pretty much no formats that a human hasn't learned to read, up to and including binary)

Ygg2 2y ago
So every text is machine-readable? Because even English can now be readable by a machine via LLM. Then why use machine-readable? Just say text.
- AndrewDucker 2y ago
  It generally means something with a well specified format which can be processed by a parser.
  - Ygg2 2y ago
    Technically, LLM can be a parser, if you tell it to output its findings in another data format, as: A parser is a software component that takes input data (typically text) and builds a data structure
    - raverbashing 2y ago
      That is a very good way of shooting yourself in the foot Now every API call is a "call to an LLM"? How much will that cost? Oh and how are you calling the LLM API in the first place?
      - Ygg2 2y ago
        Keep in mind, I consider what's machine-readable to mean, what's only readable by a machine. I.e. a magnetic tape is machine-readable, while JSON is human-readable.
        oneeyedpigeon 2y ago
        That's a minority definition. Few of the rest of us would say "JSON isn't machine-readable".
        javawizard 2y ago
        > I consider what's machine-readable to mean [...] I hate to break it to you but the world has a very different and well agreed-upon definition of what "machine readable" means. You're going to get nowhere if you continue to argue that your definition is the correct one. That ship sailed long ago.
        Ygg2 2y ago
        Ok. But what is machine-readable, then? Is a picture of my passport machine-readable? Is a PDF machine-readable? How do you classify it? And what happens when ten years in the future once algorithms become more optimized? If an AI can read Shakespeare, and parse its paragraph for verbing a noun, is all human written stuff then machine-readable?
        iinnPP 2y ago
        The picture of your passport is machine-readable to any machine that can read it. That is not all machines. The significance of JSON, and the submission itself, seems to be in the ubiquity of JSON making it more machine-readable than other formats. You're being too strict with language and definitions.
        Ygg2 2y ago
        > You're being too strict with language and definitions. Yeah, because the stricter the definition, the more useful it is. A "thing" has less informational value than a "yellow jacket" and that has less informational value than "white and yellow jacket, with Adidas logo".
        Ukv 2y ago
    - DonHopkins 2y ago
      Parsers don't hallucinate.
- cladopa 2y ago
  At 2 tokens per second? Needing a network connection or sending your data(including confidential's) to the cloud? needing very expensive GPUs? With hallucinations and tremendous energy expense. I parse things usually at a rate of 2-20 million tokens per second, on a local computer. Never hallucinates and it is always perfect. Don't get me wrong. I use LLMs a lot, but they are good at what they are good at.

Ygg2 2y ago

So every text is machine-readable? Because even English can now be readable by a machine via LLM. Then why use machine-readable? Just say text.

AndrewDucker 2y ago
It generally means something with a well specified format which can be processed by a parser.
- Ygg2 2y ago
  Technically, LLM can be a parser, if you tell it to output its findings in another data format, as: A parser is a software component that takes input data (typically text) and builds a data structure
  - raverbashing 2y ago
    That is a very good way of shooting yourself in the foot Now every API call is a "call to an LLM"? How much will that cost? Oh and how are you calling the LLM API in the first place?
    - Ygg2 2y ago
      Keep in mind, I consider what's machine-readable to mean, what's only readable by a machine. I.e. a magnetic tape is machine-readable, while JSON is human-readable.
      - oneeyedpigeon 2y ago
        That's a minority definition. Few of the rest of us would say "JSON isn't machine-readable".
      - javawizard 2y ago
        > I consider what's machine-readable to mean [...] I hate to break it to you but the world has a very different and well agreed-upon definition of what "machine readable" means. You're going to get nowhere if you continue to argue that your definition is the correct one. That ship sailed long ago.
        Ygg2 2y ago
        Ok. But what is machine-readable, then? Is a picture of my passport machine-readable? Is a PDF machine-readable? How do you classify it? And what happens when ten years in the future once algorithms become more optimized? If an AI can read Shakespeare, and parse its paragraph for verbing a noun, is all human written stuff then machine-readable?
        iinnPP 2y ago
        The picture of your passport is machine-readable to any machine that can read it. That is not all machines. The significance of JSON, and the submission itself, seems to be in the ubiquity of JSON making it more machine-readable than other formats. You're being too strict with language and definitions.
        Ygg2 2y ago
        > You're being too strict with language and definitions. Yeah, because the stricter the definition, the more useful it is. A "thing" has less informational value than a "yellow jacket" and that has less informational value than "white and yellow jacket, with Adidas logo".
        Ukv 2y ago
  - DonHopkins 2y ago
    Parsers don't hallucinate.
cladopa 2y ago
At 2 tokens per second? Needing a network connection or sending your data(including confidential's) to the cloud? needing very expensive GPUs? With hallucinations and tremendous energy expense. I parse things usually at a rate of 2-20 million tokens per second, on a local computer. Never hallucinates and it is always perfect. Don't get me wrong. I use LLMs a lot, but they are good at what they are good at.