sth's recent activity
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Comment on St Andrews researchers discover ‘King Arthur’s Hall’ is five times older than thought in ~humanities.history
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Comment on How Donald Trump won, and how Kamala Harris lost in ~society
sth Link ParentYou don't need a plan if you can just say "I hear you and the other side doesn't". Even if you are obviously an asshole and not trustworthy, if you say "yes, there is a problem, I see it" you...You don't need a plan if you can just say "I hear you and the other side doesn't". Even if you are obviously an asshole and not trustworthy, if you say "yes, there is a problem, I see it" you might still be better for you than someone else saying "it's not that bad, actually the economy is doing better than you think".
A bad person who acknowledges the problems you experience might be more convincing than a good person that seems to care more about everyone else than you.
I don't claim these are the absolute positions of any candidates and can't say if this is a deciding argument for any voters, but it seems rather believable to me.
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Comment on Paper: Feminism in Programming Language Design in ~comp
sth Link ParentI interpreted your paragraph about HTML and SQL as implying that the both languages are not seen as equal. On the surface this is obvious, since both act in completely different domains doing...I interpreted your paragraph about HTML and SQL as implying that the both languages are not seen as equal. On the surface this is obvious, since both act in completely different domains doing different things. They are very different. This didn't seem to be your point. Instead, the point seemed to be that people think lower of it, evidenced by them not calling it a programming language. A lack of prestige causes people to not accept the language as a programming language.
The point of my comment was that there is an established meaning of "programming language" that is not based on prestige, but on the languages properties. A language to write program code in. Many people use the term with that meaning and that explains why they apply it to some languages and not others.
I don't think SQL has especially high prestige and I assume not many people actually like the language a lot or think it's a great success of language design. It's ok for what it is, but that's it. I doubt it would qualify for a honorary "programming language" label, I think it gets that label through its properties. I also assume if you leave out all the "advanced" functionality for stored procedures and restrict it to just classical "SELECT/INSERT/UPDATE" clauses you can easily start a big discussion if that would really still be a proper programming language. Not because that would lessen its prestige, but because it would reduce its functionality.
To a certain extend, being a programming language (and especially a general purpose language) comes with higher prestige. But the reason for the higher status is not that somebody called it a programming language. The reason is that a general purpose programming language is very powerful and you can do a lot of interesting things with it. The narrower the language the less you can do with it and the less amazing people think the language is.
Of course this is just a rule of thumb. Writing shell scripts would generally be considered a form of programming, and shell scripting languages are programming languages, even though I feel like that has very low prestige associated to it.
So I don't see it as higher status leading to more acceptance as as programming language, rather the other way around: Higher general capabilities in the language lead to higher status. HTML only has mediocre status because there are a lot of parts where it has outgrown it's initial design and where it doesn't seem quite the best fit for many of the use cases it is used today. It works and works well in places, but also has its wired parts. So much like most other languages, not stellar, not horrible. I don't think it really has lower status than SQL, but of course that's completely subjective.
Does higher prestige in a language cause people to more likely want to learn it. Of course. In this example though it will hardly be relevant to the decision to HTML or SQL. The deciding point will be what you want to do with it, since they do completely different things.
Is it necessary to have the term "programming language" limited to just languages for writing program code? It's not necessary per se, but lots of people use it with that meaning and applying the term with a differing definition leads to confusion and, evidently, lots of unnecessary discussion.
There are thousands of computer languages and trying to have a few categories for them according to their properties makes life easier. Those language labels transport information about what that language is used for. HTML has a different use case than Javascript or SQL, so it makes sense to have a word for that. SQL also does something special, so there are labels like "query language" or "database language" to describe that. As you mention, its a "domain specific language" as opposed to a "general purpose programming language", another two categorizations that give the reader information about the capabilities and targets of a specific language. All those labels are given to languages based on their capabilities and use cases, and I claim that it's the same for the term "programming language".
Of course there are gray areas at the boundaries of these definitions, but that's always the case. With a more general definition of programming language, the problems just move. Is Markdown a programming language? It can be used to instruct the computer to render fancy formatted text. It can even be used to generate HTML. Is writing a plain text file programming? It can be used to instruct the computer to render non-fancy unformatted text. While I'm getting silly here the point is simply: there will always be corner cases where one can argue how something should be classified. That HTML is kind of on the border of some of the existing definitions is not a disparagement of HTML, it's just the nature of classifying things into different categories.
You are completely right that going into Turing completeness doesn't really help to capture what is commonly seen or used as a programming language and is therefore often not useful expect on a very technical/theoretical level. People tend to fall back on that because has not gray area. Its the one clearly defined and objective concept in that area. Something is either Turing complete or not. So that sounds nice, but is practically not as useful as one might hope. It's also a very theoretical concept, in practice nothing is Turing complete because all our programs operate on limited memory.
So why is it so important if HTML is a programming language? It isn't generally, but it seems central to your argument about it's low prestige. You argue how HTML is used in programming all the time and how not calling it a programming language therefore shows the low respect it gets. So that invites discussion if low respect really is the main reasons for not calling it a programming language and what otherwise makes a programming language.
Of course this is all tangential to the article and even the start of the comment thread, but I feel that is in the nature of long comment threads.
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Comment on Paper: Feminism in Programming Language Design in ~comp
sth Link ParentIt made me feel very skeptical because programming a computer really doesn't have any obvious, direct connection to ones sex or gender. "Feminism in Programming Language Design" reads like the...It made me feel very skeptical because programming a computer really doesn't have any obvious, direct connection to ones sex or gender. "Feminism in Programming Language Design" reads like the premise would be that current programming languages are male-focused and not really suited for women, that women are somehow disadvantaged by the current programming languages.
Knowing that computer programming is all about abstract thinking, this seems really far fetched, unless the author somehow, at least implicitly, starts from the premise that women are less capable of abstract thinking than men. I don't see any reason to believe such a difference exists, and therefore a paper discussing the consequences of that seems sexist and like a waste of time.
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Comment on Paper: Feminism in Programming Language Design in ~comp
sth Link ParentBecause HTML can't do a lot of the things classically considered programming. You can't use HTML to instruct the computer to calculate 1+1, or to sort a list of numbers or to generally get from...Why do you distinguish HTML from, say, SQL.
Because HTML can't do a lot of the things classically considered programming. You can't use HTML to instruct the computer to calculate 1+1, or to sort a list of numbers or to generally get from state A to state B. You can't implement algorithms, you can't compute a result from input data.1 That makes it different from a language like SQL.
A language like HTML describes a state, it doesn't describe how to do anything with that state. But programming is, at least from a computer science point of view, precisely that "do anything with the state" part. It's describing a path that gets you from one state to another.
So languages like HTML are often not seen as programming languages because they don't allow you to program. There are different names for languages like that and HTML would usually be described as a markup language. That doesn't mean that its not useful, just that it does a different thing.
1: Maybe you can do some of those things via some technicality like interactions with CSS, but it's definitely not what HTML is made for or what it would be practically be used for. -
Comment on Winamp deletes GitHub repository after a rocky few weeks in ~tech
sth Link ParentSpending a year in developer time understanding the existing code is still much easier and cheaper than writing the same thing with all the same functionality again from scratch. The rewrite...Spending a year in developer time understanding the existing code is still much easier and cheaper than writing the same thing with all the same functionality again from scratch. The rewrite likely takes even longer and also results in bugs and missing features.
This of course only applies if you want to have a program in the future that (roughly) does what your current program does. If what your current program does is all obsolete and the functionality it provides is all useless, then of course it's not an asset and neither changing nor rewriting it makes sense.
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Comment on They stole my voice with AI in ~tech
sth Link ParentVoices should just be protected the same way faces are. It's the audible equivalent. If you can't use someone's image in a certain way it makes sense to not be allowed to use their voice that way...Voices should just be protected the same way faces are. It's the audible equivalent. If you can't use someone's image in a certain way it makes sense to not be allowed to use their voice that way either.
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Comment on We unleashed Facebook and Instagram’s algorithms on blank accounts. They served up sexism and misogyny. in ~tech
sth Link ParentWhile it makes complete sense to try to have the data collection as neutral as possible, this will also not capture what a real new account will experience. A real account will give some...While it makes complete sense to try to have the data collection as neutral as possible, this will also not capture what a real new account will experience. A real account will give some information (useful or not) through its usage, which will cause algorithmic changes. Using an account in a "neutral" way doesn't really remove input from the algorithm, it just gives it different input, which will lead to different results.
For example the algorithm might be branching out into more and more obscure and extreme areas if nothing shown so far seems to spike the slightest reaction. That doesn't really tell us if a less robotic user would be shown the same content.
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Comment on For those involved / interested in Web3, what do you make of the near and long term future for it? in ~tech
sth Link ParentThe core idea of web3 is a mechanism to have a tamper-proof database. The way to make the database temper proof is essentially to share it between a lot of people and make it in everyone's self...The core idea of web3 is a mechanism to have a tamper-proof database.
The way to make the database temper proof is essentially to share it between a lot of people and make it in everyone's self interest to be part of the majority consensus of the current state of the database. The pioneer here is Bitcoin which stores the current owners of all the Bitcoins in its database. To incentivize people to participate in maintaining the database and keep every individual's self interest aligned with the majority, people get some Bitcoin for doing so.
That mechanism of creating a tamper-proof database is extended by web3 to add more information to the database. They all use basically the same "digital currency" mechanism as Bitcoin to create a tamper-proof database, but they store additional things in the database. Notably for example Etherium stores small programs in the database that can be used to manipulate the data (think "stored procedures" if you are familiar with databases).
Using some variation of such a database is the defining feature of web3.
Since the basic foundation of all of these databases is a "digital currency" mechanism derived from Bitcoin and that digital currency is used as an incentive to keep the database running and tamper-proof, monetization and speculation with the things using that database comes naturally. Often that promise of potential value is a main selling point to users and why those things are built in the first place.
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Comment on For those involved / interested in Web3, what do you make of the near and long term future for it? in ~tech
sth Link ParentEven for trust, its more a theoretical improvement than a practical one. It only applies to transaction on the blockchain itself and as soon as you interface with anything else the guarantees are...Even for trust, its more a theoretical improvement than a practical one. It only applies to transaction on the blockchain itself and as soon as you interface with anything else the guarantees are gone.
If you pay for some goods with cypto, nothing on the blockchain ensures that you actually get those goods. If you want to sell your crypo for dollars, nothing on the blockchain ensures that money actually ends up in your bank account.
Even for transactions on the blockchain itself, users typically have to trust that no adversarial transactions are possible in every situation. This trust is often misplaced, as can be seen by the constant stream of hacks, bugs and fraud where millions are transferred against the users intentions.
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Comment on Hey, monthly mystery commenters, what's up with the hit-and-runs? in ~tildes
sth Link ParentI don't think the intend should be individual communication at all. To me, the whole point of having a discussion on a public site like this is that everybody can jump in and add their insight. If...I don't think the intend should be individual communication at all. To me, the whole point of having a discussion on a public site like this is that everybody can jump in and add their insight. If that's not the point, why have the discussion in a public place with open participation in the first place?
I agree that bumping to the front page is a feature. Why write something if not for other people to read it. And if I want to read others opinions about a topic, of course I want to see when somebody adds something new.
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Comment on Backdoor in upstream libxz targeting sshd in ~comp
sth Link ParentAnd a detailed an well explained analysis of the shell scripts/... injecting the malware into the build process from the same blog: https://research.swtch.com/xz-scriptAnd a detailed an well explained analysis of the shell scripts/... injecting the malware into the build process from the same blog: https://research.swtch.com/xz-script
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Comment on What is the horrible phrase my wife learned from her grandpa? in ~humanities.languages
sth LinkThere are just too many steps where inaccuracies to the original phrase/sound get introduced, from some original expression to how your wife's grandpa pronounced it to how your wife as a child...There are just too many steps where inaccuracies to the original phrase/sound get introduced, from some original expression to how your wife's grandpa pronounced it to how your wife as a child tried to say it, how she remembers it today, how you translated it to IPA and how a random reader imagines that IPA to be pronounced. Chances to get something recognizable get much higher by cutting out as many of those steps as possible, which in this case would mean to listen to your wife say it. That still might be very far from the original phrase, but it's the best we can hope for.
Additionally additional context would be useful. When did the grandpa say it? Did he for example use it to swear at people or when something went wrong? Or did he say it when he was excited about something? That might narrow it down a bit.
Since grandpa learned the phrase while in Germany, the most likely option is that it's German. The only reasonable German word I could hear is the part "krɛplj jɛɽɛ", which might be "krepiere!". That means "die miserably!" and could very well be part of a "horrible phrase". The preceding "ʃɛ" is also a common sound in German and might be part of another word.
The implication is that the "Hall" is unrelated to King Arthur, though it seems that is no surprise to historians:
It just has the name "King Arthur's Hall".