Shamar @Shamar@qoto.org

@minimalprocedure@mastodon.uno

is it?

if you have a windows machine at hand (or maybe even just a working wine setup) you might give a look at this archive of Plain English prototype kindly provided by Osmosian: http://www.osmosian.com/cal-4700.zip

Note that there is no License, so it's basically all right reserved: I cannot even legally send you it by email, since it would be a way to distribute it: you can only download it from their website.

Anyway, even if you don't have a windows machine to run the exe, you can read the source code of "the compiler", "the desktop", "the finder" and so on. These are the name of the file containg the actual sources.

Also you can give a look at the instructions.pdf in documentation folder.

I do not think it has anything to do with AI or people commanding to computer.

It's simply a programming language with a sentence based syntax that is a proper subset of English.

There are two main aspects of it that I find VERY mind challenging:

1) the readability: anyone who can read English can read the compiler

2) the design choices

I don't know if this readability can be surpassed (while I'm sure that the tradeoff between readability and write-ability CAN be largely improved).

4389 lines for a compiler (or eve ~20000 if you include the noodle) proves that the language is NOT verbose as it looks.

No nested loop, nested if and no variable names sounds crazy design choice and yet... somehow they works.

I don't know.

@minimalprocedure@mastodon.uno

The problem I see with this approach is that the Plain English approach might be too simple.

Probably, it would be perfect to democratize computer programming (the more I think about it, the more it makes sense) but ONLY computer programming.

I mean, perfect to command computers to execute tasks, but it would limit their educational potential, to teach people rational and critical thinking.

It's something weird to say.

No nested loop.
No nested conditional.
No named argument.
No objects or classess.
No macro.

Design patterns?
Probably not many.

I don't know.

This approach is perfect to program, it turns computer programming into a trivial task, but it might remove most of the potential of Informatics.

What do you think about this?

@minimalprocedure@mastodon.uno

Much less impressive in my humble opinion.

The Plain English's approach does not try to compile plain English but to compile a simple imperative subset of it that is enough to actually program a computer.

Its procedures really resamble recipes, it doesn't support nested loops or conditional and not even need variable names!

In a way, it somewhat remember a forth (but it's completely different).

FIM++ and other natural language pl are too convoluted because they try to be MORE flexible.

Holy SHIT!

Plain English Programming... for true!

And nobody told me!
IMPRESSIVE ! ! !

https://osmosianplainenglishprogramming.blog/

@ekaitz_zarraga

Sketch of The Analytical Engine invented by Charles #Babbage.

The notes of #AdaLovelace are really REALLY something any programmer should read.

In particular, the famous Note G first lines are prophetic.

```
It is desirable to guard against the possibility of exaggerated ideas that might arise as to the powers of the Analytical Engine. In considering any new subject, there is frequently a tendency, first, to overrate what we find to be already interesting or remarkable; and, secondly, by a sort of natural reaction, to undervalue the true state of the case, when we do discover that our notions have surpassed those that were really tenable.

The Analytical Engine has no pretensions whatever to originate anything. It can do whatever we know how to order it to perform. It can follow analysis; but it has no power of anticipating any analytical relations or truths. Its province is to assist us in making available what we are already acquainted with. This it is calculated to effect primarily and chiefly of course, through its executive faculties; but it is likely to exert an indirect and reciprocal influence on science itself in another manner. For, in so distributing and combining the truths and the formulæ of analysis, that they may become most easily and rapidly amenable to the mechanical combinations of the engine, the relations and the nature of many subjects in that science are necessarily thrown into new lights, and more profoundly investigated. This is a decidedly indirect, and a somewhat speculative, consequence of such an invention. It is however pretty evident, on general principles, that in devising for mathematical truths a new form in which to record and throw themselves out for actual use, views are likely to be induced, which should again react on the more theoretical phase of the subject. There are in all extensions of human power, or additions to human knowledge, various collateral influences, besides the main and primary object attained.
```

http://www.fourmilab.ch/babbage/sketch.html

@rysiek

The argument about the derivative work is plain wrong, and I'm really surprised that Julia Reda wrote something like this.¹

```
On the other hand, the argument that the outputs of GitHub Copilot are derivative works of the training data is based on the assumption that a machine can produce works. This assumption is wrong and counterproductive. Copyright law has only ever applied to intellectual creations – where there is no creator, there is no work. This means that machine-generated code like that of GitHub Copilot is not a work under copyright law at all, so it is not a derivative work either. The output of a machine simply does not qualify for copyright protection – it is in the public domain. That is good news for the open movement and not something that needs fixing.
```

The output of a compiler is under the copyright of the authors of the sources because the machine does NOT add anything creative, but only apply an algorithmic transform to the sources.

Thus the output of a compiler is under the copyright of the authors of the sources.

Similarly a zip containing the sources is under the #copyright of the authors of the sources.

The training of #GitHubCopilot's model just did the same: it turned sources under their authors' copyright into a big opaque archive (aka blackbox #OpenAI) that can be queried through an API.

Thus the model is protected under the copyright of all the authors of the original sources.
And since such code were distributed under #AGPLv3 code, the whole model must be distributed within 30 days to prevent a termination of the license.

Sure, I'd be very happy to learn that zipping a book or ripping a dvd would end the rights of the copyright holders.

But if I cannot algorithmically transform #windows11 binaries, say by decompiling them, ending #Microsoft's right on the output, then Microsoft cannot transform my #AGPLv3 code without complying with the license.
____
¹ Or at least, I would have been surprised months ago, before she signed the "open letter" against #RMS to divide the #FreeSoftware movement

@tindall@cybre.space

@natecull

That's something that bother me too.

Types are logical predicates over memory areas (and maybe other resources).

They can be true or false and they can be kept true at compile time, checked at runtime or both.

Ultimately, inheritance is just implication: if A extends B, then all predicates that are true for a memory area of type B must be true for a memory area of type A too, so A => B.

Liskow substitution principle is just plain implication.

@oleotar@mastodon.uno

In realtà siamo molto più prevedibili di quanto ci piaccia pensare.

https://video.resolutions.it/videos/watch/c9b50e80-85de-4b62-bc3a-8f6501d26b65?start=0h59m40s

@quinta

ERRATA CORRIGE

"Neurons Act Not As Simple Logic Gates, But As Complex, Multi-Unit Processing Systems"

@guenther

#COPPA compliance is a US issue¹.
So if they do not own the whole copyright, such a new restriction terminates their #GPLv2 license.

The problem is that nobody is going to sue #Audacity's new owners and they will go away with that.

¹ but where was COPPA when #Google, #Microsoft, #Zoom and friends were collecting tons of biometric and personal data of kids all over the world during remote schooling in the pandemic?

@cypnk