alankay1

28 ms·

301.
by alankay1 10y ago
"Dealers of Lightning" is not the best book to read (try Mitchell Waldrop's "The Dream Machine"). That said, Bob Taylor cannot be praised too highly, both for Parc and for his earlier stint as one of the ARPA-IPTO d
302.
by alankay1 10y ago
It's basically confusing "math" (which they had and like all of us were overwhelmed by how neat it is and how much you can do with "thinking rationally") with "science" which they didn't really have.
303.
by alankay1 10y ago
How about a little model of time in a GUI?
304.
by alankay1 10y ago
They need a much better idea of time (such as approaches to McCarthy's fluents). And then there is the issue that we need to make "systems" ... I like what a function is, and this idea should be used, but I think it is bett
305.
by alankay1 10y ago
I think all languages today annoy me -- just put me down as a grump. They seem to be at a very weak level of discourse for the 21st century. (But a few are fun when looked at from the perspectives of the past e.g. Erlang ...)
306.
by alankay1 10y ago
I don't think "pop culture" approaches are the best way to do most things (though "every once in a while" something good does happen). The real question is "does a hack reset 'normal'?" For most
307.
by alankay1 10y ago
YCR is not "my group" -- I'm very happy to have helped set up HARC! with its very impressive group of Principal Investigators (including Bret).
308.
by alankay1 10y ago
I love Bret Victor's work! He is certainly one of the most interesting and best thinkers of today.
309.
by alankay1 10y ago
The real reason to do the 2nd order is get new things rather than incrementing on older poorer ideas.
310.
by alankay1 10y ago
This is a tough question. (And always has been in a sense, because every era has had projects where the tool building has sunk the project into a black hole.) It really helped at Parc to work with real geniuses like Chuck Thacker and Dan In
311.
by alankay1 10y ago
Most of them ...
312.
by alankay1 10y ago
You could "hot-edit" Lisp (1.85 at BBN) in the 60s (and there were other such systems). Smalltalk at Parc in the 70s used many of these ideas, and went even further. Development environments should help programmers think (but what
313.
by alankay1 10y ago
Smalltalk in the 70s was "just a great thing" for its time. The pragmatic fact of also wanting to run in it real-time fast enough for dynamic media and interactions and to have it fit within the 64Kbyte (maybe a smidge more) Alto
314.
by alankay1 10y ago
I think I'd ask "What programming language design would help us think a lot better than we do now (we are currently terrible!) Certainly, in this day and age, the lack of safe meta-definition is pretty much shocking.
315.
by alankay1 10y ago
If you start with "desirable process" you can eventually work your way back to the power plug in the wall. If you start with something already plugged in, you might miss a lot of truly desirable processes. Part of working your way
316.
by alankay1 10y ago
For big problems, "finding the problem" is paramount -- this will often suggest representation systems that will help think and do better. A language that allows you to quickly make and refine your sense of the context and discour
317.
by alankay1 10y ago
We could use a few "good ones" (meaning ones that really are about the realities, needs and scales of the 21st century).
318.
by alankay1 10y ago
I've been constantly surprised about how what I called "object-oriented" and "system-oriented" got neutered into Abstract Data Types, etc., (I think because people wanted to retain the old ways of programming with p
319.
by alankay1 10y ago
-- I was surprised that the HN list page didn't automatically refresh in my browser (seems as though it should be live and not have to be prompted ...)
320.
by alankay1 10y ago
That was Marvin's comment, and I'm quite sure that he meant it literally, i.e. not as a comment on either science or philosophy, but on "most philosophy".
321.
by alankay1 10y ago
I don't understand this question, but it sounds as though a good answer could be "yes" ... please say more ...
322.
by alankay1 10y ago
The final part is about "microcode" etc. in being able to get the most flexibility/performance from hardware. A good heuristic is to look far out (30 years) for "It would be ridiculous if we didn't have ...". S
323.
by alankay1 10y ago
"Flex" has been a very popular label for computer systems. I was referring to an early desktop computer done by Ed Cheadle and myself in the late 60s for a company owned by LTV (Ling Tempco Vought -- an aerospace conglomerate). Th
324.
by alankay1 10y ago
I've been a huge fan of Margaret Hamilton for a long time. Her story is in many ways what can be wonderful about great design and creation by really smart and able people, and so disappointing about our not-quite-a-field. (And if you w
325.
by alankay1 10y ago
I'll try to reply to this in sections. One way to think of "magic" is height of leap. Newton had something before him, but his leap was cosmic. I don't think we've had a Newton yet in computing, but we have had some
326.
by alankay1 10y ago
Thank you!
327.
by alankay1 10y ago
I'd like to meet the combination of the rabbi and the survivalist! But I'm the PARC one.
328.
by alankay1 10y ago
It's about Bob Barton, why would you mark it off topic?
329.
by alankay1 10y ago
There's a classical clarinetist, a judge, a rugby player, a rabbi, a survivalist, a computerist, ... Which one were you hoping for?
330.
by alankay1 10y ago
Bob Barton is in a class of early computer people I don't think can be over-praised. However, just to put a caution on the hyperbole, I had been a journeyman programmer in the Air Force and then at NCAR -- the latter to work my way thr

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