<steve@watchfield.com> writes
>Aaron's final comment seems to have got lost in the general discussion:
>>Is anyone interested in forming a collaborative project to provide
>>the gsl extension to pop-11???
My request for explanation/example of 'gsl extension to pop-11'
received no reply.
My initial guess that it refered to greater mathematical functionality,
is apparently wrong ? A superficial look suggests that there's already
substantial maths capability.
Since gsl is merely a legal consideration, what technical extensions
was Aaron suggesting ?
Apparently over time, poplog users consider it to be their main
general-purpose language/tool ?
This contrasts to what drew me to poplog: by far the best available
(a must have) tool for AI. I'm disapointed that the unique AI capabilities
that poplog offers are submerged by emphasis on 'low level' considerations.
I'm reminded of (decades ago) motor enthusiasts who were continually
'tuning their machine' and 'improving on the original designers' effort',
yet never got around to making a substantial journey.
I've observed the social/psycological aspect of the 'development' of
the OS/language oberon, which is also university based and has
outside collaboration:
with a frequency of multiples of the stock market irrational cycles,
enthusiasm arises to redesign the compiler with some bleeding-edge
optimisation, which would save me 2 milliseconds a year.
Yet vast numbers of applications remain unusable for lack of documentation.
Poplog beginners are lucky that substantial documentation exists.
All poplog users benefit by making it easier for new entrants - who
become potential contributors. Nobody can do the unpleasant task
of proof reading and detailed testing better than the ignorant (unbaised)
beginner. It just needs a bit of 'management from above to harness the
man power'.
I guess this whole topic "dynamics of dispersed collaboration" will be a
recongised 'subject' soon -- of growing importance due to inet.
Apparently linux was/is created by dispersed collaboration.
Chris Glur.
PS. lets have a formal definition/proposal for the gsl extensions.
I stick by my (disputed) view that poplog has taken the wrong route
in being informal:
"AI pretends to imitate humans; hence welcomes ambiguity and
redundancy".
Aviation wasn't advance by imitating the birds, with feathers and flapping.
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