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The World’s Most Mind-Bending Language Has the Best Development Environment

33 points by nreece 17y ago

StrawberryFrog 17y ago
Comments say "J is just APL done in ASCII". Which is odd really, since many other new languages e.g. java, and c#. have source in Unicode. Yes, your class or method names can contain/be funky Unicode characters.
- sb 17y ago
  hi, the comment is not meant in /that/ way; rather APL used special symbols for representing functions/operations, i.e., it had its own non-ASCII character set (google for details) AFAIR, there was also a java programming puzzler with unicode in comments: since the unicode support is (was? probably there have been some changes since 1.4 footnote:1) beautifully added on top of the parser you can get seemingly strange errors from the parser/compiler. (please google for details, too) 1: please correct me if that is not true anymore, has been quite a while since i read the puzzlers...
- coliveira 17y ago
  The story says that to use the original APL you needed a special keyboard, because it used mathematical symbols that are not in ASCII. J doesn't use any non-ASCII characters, however it uses ALL punctuation characters you can think of :-))
diiq 17y ago
It's worth the read, if only for the reminder that languages are programming tools. It's not enough just to have the right functions, a clear syntax. I love me some snap-on wrenches --- they are the best in the world --- but I need other tools, too! I'd never touch lisp if I didn't have SLIME, or python without the standard library.
desu 17y ago
Well, I was interested enough to download and run the OSX version. Fails with some library issue, even tried off the disk image which the help says can be done. I'm sure it's great but not exactly a good first impression for this mac user!
- desu 17y ago
  Downvote me if it makes you feel better, but it still doesn't work.
PStamatiou 17y ago
ah i thought this article was going to be about brainfuck (esoteric as esoteric gets..). hello world: ++++++++++[>+++++++>++++++++++>+++>+<<<<-]>++.>+.+++++++..+++.>++.<<+++++++++++++++.>.+++.------.--------.>+.>.
- wingo 17y ago
  scheme@(guile-user)> ,L brainfuck Guile Brainfuck interpreter 1.0 on Guile 1.9.2 Copyright (C) 2001-2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Enter `,help' for help. brainfuck@(guile-user)> ++++++++++[>+++++++>++++++++++>+++>+<<<<-]>++.>+.+++++++..+++.>++.<<+++++++++++++++.>.+++.------.--------.>+.>.] Hello World! brainfuck@(guile-user)>
bitwize 17y ago
Somebody hasn't tried Brainfuck or Malbolge.
coliveira 17y ago
I tried J a few weeks ago and was really delighted. Since then, I have spent a few hours learning the many verbs (the way they call built in functions). It is really a great experience.
olliesaunders 17y ago
> I highly recommend that all programmers learn J. Really? How well? I played with J over a weekend and familiarised myself with the gist of its philosophy, some time ago; enough to know how much time it might take to learn J well. But I stopped quite quickly when I realised how much time it would take to master. It's not impossible and the learning curve isn't too steep, you can piece knowledge together quite nicely (I think) but that curve is very long. I'm glad J exists but I'd really like someone to explain to me why, and in a lot of detail, I should learn it if they are going to make that suggestion.
jamesbritt 17y ago
“>> << Ndx Usr Pri JfC LJ Phr Dic Rel Voc !: wd Help ” ... suggests this is not something I want to spend a lot of time on. Is anything supposed to be this arcane and unintuitive?

33 points by nreece 17y ago

Comments say "J is just APL done in ASCII". Which is odd really, since many other new languages e.g. java, and c#. have source in Unicode. Yes, your class or method names can contain/be funky Unicode characters.

sb 17y ago
hi, the comment is not meant in /that/ way; rather APL used special symbols for representing functions/operations, i.e., it had its own non-ASCII character set (google for details) AFAIR, there was also a java programming puzzler with unicode in comments: since the unicode support is (was? probably there have been some changes since 1.4 footnote:1) beautifully added on top of the parser you can get seemingly strange errors from the parser/compiler. (please google for details, too) 1: please correct me if that is not true anymore, has been quite a while since i read the puzzlers...
coliveira 17y ago
The story says that to use the original APL you needed a special keyboard, because it used mathematical symbols that are not in ASCII. J doesn't use any non-ASCII characters, however it uses ALL punctuation characters you can think of :-))

diiq 17y ago

It's worth the read, if only for the reminder that languages are programming tools. It's not enough just to have the right functions, a clear syntax. I love me some snap-on wrenches --- they are the best in the world --- but I need other tools, too! I'd never touch lisp if I didn't have SLIME, or python without the standard library.

desu 17y ago

Well, I was interested enough to download and run the OSX version. Fails with some library issue, even tried off the disk image which the help says can be done. I'm sure it's great but not exactly a good first impression for this mac user!

desu 17y ago
Downvote me if it makes you feel better, but it still doesn't work.

PStamatiou 17y ago

ah i thought this article was going to be about brainfuck (esoteric as esoteric gets..). hello world: ++++++++++[>+++++++>++++++++++>+++>+<<<<-]>++.>+.+++++++..+++.>++.<<+++++++++++++++.>.+++.------.--------.>+.>.

wingo 17y ago
scheme@(guile-user)> ,L brainfuck Guile Brainfuck interpreter 1.0 on Guile 1.9.2 Copyright (C) 2001-2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Enter `,help' for help. brainfuck@(guile-user)> ++++++++++[>+++++++>++++++++++>+++>+<<<<-]>++.>+.+++++++..+++.>++.<<+++++++++++++++.>.+++.------.--------.>+.>.] Hello World! brainfuck@(guile-user)>

bitwize 17y ago

Somebody hasn't tried Brainfuck or Malbolge.

coliveira 17y ago

I tried J a few weeks ago and was really delighted. Since then, I have spent a few hours learning the many verbs (the way they call built in functions). It is really a great experience.

olliesaunders 17y ago

> I highly recommend that all programmers learn J. Really? How well? I played with J over a weekend and familiarised myself with the gist of its philosophy, some time ago; enough to know how much time it might take to learn J well. But I stopped quite quickly when I realised how much time it would take to master. It's not impossible and the learning curve isn't too steep, you can piece knowledge together quite nicely (I think) but that curve is very long. I'm glad J exists but I'd really like someone to explain to me why, and in a lot of detail, I should learn it if they are going to make that suggestion.

jamesbritt 17y ago

“>> << Ndx Usr Pri JfC LJ Phr Dic Rel Voc !: wd Help ” ... suggests this is not something I want to spend a lot of time on. Is anything supposed to be this arcane and unintuitive?