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canonical/syntax-diagrams representation.

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  canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. no.top.post@gmail.com - 2011-05-16 10:37 +0000
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Adam Prescott <adam@aprescott.com> - 2011-05-16 06:15 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Peter Hickman <peterhickman386@googlemail.com> - 2011-05-16 06:24 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2011-05-16 06:52 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Clifford Heath <no@spam.please.net> - 2011-05-17 09:17 +1000
      Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Ryan Davis <ryand-ruby@zenspider.com> - 2011-05-16 19:50 -0500
        Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Stu <stu@rubyprogrammer.net> - 2011-05-17 02:41 -0500
        Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2011-05-18 20:35 +0200
      Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Robert Dober <robert.dober@gmail.com> - 2011-05-20 05:07 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Stu <stu@rubyprogrammer.net> - 2011-05-16 18:30 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. William Rutiser <wruyahoo05@comcast.net> - 2011-05-16 19:21 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Justin Collins <justincollins@ucla.edu> - 2011-05-17 04:24 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. "Markus H." <shevegen@gmail.com> - 2011-05-19 12:57 -0500
      Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Kevin <darkintent@gmail.com> - 2011-05-19 13:42 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Brian Candler <b.candler@pobox.com> - 2011-05-20 03:25 -0500
      Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Josh Cheek <josh.cheek@gmail.com> - 2011-05-20 07:34 -0500
        Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. spiralofhope <spiralofhope_rubyml@lavabit.com> - 2011-05-20 13:24 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Intransition <transfire@gmail.com> - 2011-05-20 08:12 -0500
    Re: canonical/syntax-diagrams representation. Intransition <transfire@gmail.com> - 2011-05-20 08:12 -0500

#4596 — canonical/syntax-diagrams representation.

I started investigating ruby.
It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!

The bloke who heads 'intentional programming' wrote a 
good article explaining why <having too many degrees
of freedom> makes the task more difficult, as you already
know intuitively.

Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
want to make a <template driven editor> for my `mc`;
where the basic structures can be merely filled in.

We don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary
syntax -- do we?

IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the 
syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
the 70s.

Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.  
We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.

Thanks,

== Chris Glur.

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#4601

[Note:  parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

On Mon, May 16, 2011 at 11:42 AM, <no.top.post@gmail.com> wrote:

> I started investigating ruby.
>
> [Ruby sucks, variety sucks, let's use PASCAL.]
>
> Thanks,
>
> == Chris Glur
>

What were you hoping to achieve by bringing this to a mailing list of Ruby
users and people who really like Ruby?

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#4602

On 16 May 2011 11:42,  <no.top.post@gmail.com> wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.

Strange that, plenty of people seem to be using it just for that
purpose. What do you think it should be used for?

> The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
> or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
> or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!

The trailing IF is a very old form of syntax, it certainly goes back
to Basic on the VAX it might go back even further than that (Algol
maybe). We seem to have coped somehow.

'{ ... }' and 'do ... end' are slightly different.

> The bloke who heads 'intentional programming' wrote a
> good article explaining why <having too many degrees
> of freedom> makes the task more difficult, as you already
> know intuitively.

I suspect that your intuition and ours are at some variance.

Who is this 'bloke', does he have a name? How about a link to the article.

> Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
> want to make a <template driven editor> for my `mc`;
> where the basic structures can be merely filled in.

If you were a programmer rather than a troll you woud have completed
this task by now and moved on.

> We don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary
> syntax -- do we?

Who is this 'we' you speak of, it certainly better not include me.

> IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the
> syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
> the 70s.

The syntax diagram was EBNF and had nothing to do with Pascal other
than the syntax diagram for Pascal is available in EBNF. As are the
diagrams for several other languages.

> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.

If this is all you wanted to ask then what was with all the preamble?

> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.

Again, show is this 'we' you talk about?

> Thanks,

No thanks

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#4603

On Mon, May 16, 2011 at 12:42 PM,  <no.top.post@gmail.com> wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.

Please, then do not use it.  Thank you.

Please move on everybody, nothing to see here.

Cheers

robert


-- 
remember.guy do |as, often| as.you_can - without end
http://blog.rubybestpractices.com/

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#4644

On 05/16/11 20:37, no.top.post@gmail.com wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.

This line is the reason you have alienated other respondents.
That's a pity, because the rest of your message is reasonable.
On behalf of the Ruby community, I'd like to say that their
response was... embarrassing at best. When did this community
become so... insular, defensive, and basically just unpleasant?
It certainly wasn't like that in 2002 when I joined it.
C'mon folks, we're better than this...

> The bloke who heads 'intentional programming'

Charles Simonyi, <http://www.intentsoft.com/>. He was the
prime mover behind the creation of icrosoft Word and Excel,
so (however little you may like those) he's no lightweight.
Intentional have been in a dark pre-startup phase doing some
pretty interesting things for some years now (even if Charles'
first patent in the area was a decade after my almost identical
invention, presented to HP in 1987). Prior art, any one? I have
records...

> Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
> want to make a<template driven editor>  for my `mc`;
> where the basic structures can be merely filled in.

Good idea, but *very* hard with Ruby's syntax.

> IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the
> syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
> the 70s.

You can get railroad diagrams from ANTLRworks for any ANTLR
grammar. However they (and syntax-directed editors in general)
are much less effective for languages that require significant
look-ahead.If you manage to make an ANTLR grammar for Ruby,
I'll be a little amazed (though it's definitely possible)
and you'll be a hero in here. But it's a massive task.
The LALR-based grammar for Ruby has many context-sensitive
areas which rely on large look-ahead.

> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.
> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.

No such syntax description exists. Even if it did, a syntax
directed editor probably wouldn't work very well for Ruby.

Clifford Heath.

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#4647

On May 16, 2011, at 16:20 , Clifford Heath wrote:

> You can get railroad diagrams from ANTLRworks for any ANTLR
> grammar. However they (and syntax-directed editors in general)
> are much less effective for languages that require significant
> look-ahead.If you manage to make an ANTLR grammar for Ruby,
> I'll be a little amazed (though it's definitely possible)
> and you'll be a hero in here. But it's a massive task.
> The LALR-based grammar for Ruby has many context-sensitive
> areas which rely on large look-ahead.

Well, given that Terr gave up on the antlr ruby grammar, I'm not sure how possible it is (versus how much of a time sink it is). To the OP's benefit, Ruby's grammar is a fucking mess. There are some constructs in ruby that make LL parsing problematic. Getting bison2antlr to work on ruby's parse.y is a chore, and even then you need to do a LOT of work to get the left recursion worked out of it. Until you do, the railroad diagrams are pretty much useless.

While I assume that the OP is trolling with that first paragraph, I can't be sure... I think that a lot of the responses in this thread shouldn't have been made. It's one thing when you're Ilias, but in this case we really can't be sure. Robert and Stu's responses were fine examples of how we shouldn't behave.

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#4662

On Mon, May 16, 2011 at 7:50 PM, Ryan Davis <ryand-ruby@zenspider.com> wrote:
>
> While I assume that the OP is trolling with that first paragraph, I can't be sure... I think that a lot of the responses in this thread shouldn't have been made. It's one thing when you're Ilias, but in this case we really can't be sure. Robert and Stu's responses were fine examples of how we shouldn't behave.
>

While it certainly depresses me that you feel this way Ryan and I hope
one day you and I can get past that.  Though you may see his post for
it's ambiguity I do not.

I do see the OP as either an megalomaniac due to the assumption 'that
ruby is NOT good for computing' and simply trolling on syntactical
structure. I imagine his stress comes from this iteration in learning
yet another programming language and realizing it really can't be
grokked as quickly as his other nth paradigm languages.

Ruby has become his strawman with statements his statements like: We
don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary syntax -- do we? and
<having too many degrees of freedom> makes the task more difficult

This here is the flamebait I responded passionately to.

OP in effort to avoid your argument ad hominem in the future please read this:

http://catb.org/esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

After that if you would like to have a discussion about how the
harmonic minor scale relates to the Ruby programming language we can
then discuss in euphemistic doublespeak how music has evolved from the
dark ages to the early renaissance.

~Stu

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#4741

On 17.05.2011 02:50, Ryan Davis wrote:

> While I assume that the OP is trolling with that first paragraph, I
> can't be sure... I think that a lot of the responses in this thread
> shouldn't have been made. It's one thing when you're Ilias, but in
> this case we really can't be sure. Robert and Stu's responses were
> fine examples of how we shouldn't behave.

Apparently the irony in my posting didn't get through to you.  Sorry 
about that.

Cheers

	robert

-- 
remember.guy do |as, often| as.you_can - without end
http://blog.rubybestpractices.com/

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#4806

On Tue, May 17, 2011 at 1:20 AM, Clifford Heath <no@spam.please.net> wrote:
> On 05/16/11 20:37, no.top.post@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> I started investigating ruby.
>> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
>
> This line is the reason you have alienated other respondents.
> That's a pity, because the rest of your message is reasonable.
> On behalf of the Ruby community, I'd like to say that their
> response was... embarrassing at best.
You should not be embarrassed, if somebody trolls than she is bound to
be ignored, and if following a trolly message are instructions of how
to build a cold fusion reactor, than that is just a shame, but it is
the troller, who is responsible for that miss, not the trollees, who,
rightly, refused to be such.

How much interesting information will you get by reading such posts,
in the long run?

Cheers
Robert

-- 
You’ll never be up to date, but you can be ahead
-- Kent Beck

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#4645

I don't think this is the programming language for you.

On Mon, May 16, 2011 at 5:42 AM,  <no.top.post@gmail.com> wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
> The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
> or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
> or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!
>
> The bloke who heads 'intentional programming' wrote a
> good article explaining why <having too many degrees
> of freedom> makes the task more difficult, as you already
> know intuitively.
>
> Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
> want to make a <template driven editor> for my `mc`;
> where the basic structures can be merely filled in.
>
> We don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary
> syntax -- do we?
>
> IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the
> syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
> the 70s.
>
> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.
> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.
>
> Thanks,
>
> == Chris Glur.
>
>
>

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#4646

On 2011-05-16 6:42 AM, no.top.post@gmail.com wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
> The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
> or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
> or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!
>
> The bloke who heads 'intentional programming' wrote a
> good article explaining why<having too many degrees
> of freedom>  makes the task more difficult, as you already
> know intuitively.
>
> Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
> want to make a<template driven editor>  for my `mc`;
> where the basic structures can be merely filled in.
>
> We don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary
> syntax -- do we?
>
> IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the
> syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
> the 70s.
>
> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.
> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.
>
> Thanks,
>
> == Chris Glur.

You may find these useful:
http://ruby.runpaint.org/
http://www.ipa.go.jp/software/open/ossc/english/ruby/Ruby_final_draft_enu_20100825.pdf

While not online,
[ "The Ruby Programming Language", David Flanagan & Yukihiro Matsumoto, 
O'reilly ]
is pretty thorough and concise.

Bill Rutiser

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#4664

On 05/16/2011 03:42 AM, no.top.post@gmail.com wrote:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
> The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
> or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
> or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!

Which is bad? The informal specification, the actual syntax, or the 
verbose introduction you are using? (I think the latter?)

> The bloke who heads 'intentional programming' wrote a
> good article explaining why<having too many degrees
> of freedom>  makes the task more difficult, as you already
> know intuitively.

Not sure I agree. For example, why do we have "unless" and "until" when 
we already have "if not" and "while not"? Because sometimes it's more 
natural to use one or the other. _Too_ many options may be a problem, 
but I don't think Ruby has _too_ many.

> Because this is my Nth programming language, I just
> want to make a<template driven editor>  for my `mc`;
> where the basic structures can be merely filled in.

Sorry, I do not understand what you want here. Unlike some other 
languages, Ruby (as you noted) has a fairly fluid structure. I do not 
even know what a template would look like for a Ruby program.

> We don't want to be bothered with ANOTHER arbitrary
> syntax -- do we?

I don't think it's arbitrary. Ruby's syntax is one of its best features 
in terms of being (in my opinion) well-designed and intentional.

> IMO the clearest syntax representation ever, was the
> syntax-diagram format of PASCAL which was used in
> the 70s.
>
> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.
> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.
>
> Thanks,
>
> == Chris Glur

If you want to write a parser, then I don't know of such a resource. If 
you just want to learn the language, there are online resources readily 
available which outline the syntax in a less verbose way. (But I assume 
those are not what you want, because they are easily found.)

-Justin

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#4770

It is difficult to assess whether someone is trolling or just 
disagreeing.

The benefit of doubt should exist.

That said, I want to comment just one thing:

> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.
> The chatty syntax introduction that: IF can come before
> or after, as you like, and arguments can be bracketed
> or not, as you like and block can use "}" or END; is BAD!

The problem is, you made a statement, but you did not explain why it 
would not be suitable for computing.

It is just syntax after all.

My ruby code is very clean in most cases and I found a code
style which suits me. I love being able to append if or unless


show_debug_message() if @debug

This almost reads like a natural language to me (I tend to use a @debug 
variable for my larger projects when I am debugging them.)

Sure you can do almost the same in other languages, but ruby seems to be 
a lot terser than others.

-- 
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

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#4777

I don't mind the flexibility of using braces or the end keyword to end
things like blocks.  I also do not mind the optional parenthesis for
function calls.  I've started to write mine without them just to get
used to the idea so that when I have some down time Haskell will not
look as weird.  It also save me some typing which is nice since I have
difficulty using my hands. Though I do think that using parenthesis
*is* better in terms of letting people know that something is a
function and not something else when it takes arguments.

With respect to formal grammar specifications, I do not think that
they are necessarily as useful if they are viewed in isolation.  What
I would like to see is the grammar spec integrated into the standard
documentation so people can readily cross-reference what they read
with the spec.  When I first started playing around with Haskell I
found it very hard to get a handle on things because I had to
constantly flip back between the documentation for a function, Real
World Haskell, and the specification.  Having to build a map in your
head of a language by looking at a dictionary and a grammar book was
acceptable prior to the invention of hypertext.  We should not have to
be doing that in the modern era with any language.  But it seems like
we have simply overlooked this part of learning and continued to do
things the old way as if we had a limit to how many pages we could
cram into a single electronic document.

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#4803

unknown wrote in post #998975:
> I started investigating ruby.
> It's very informal, which is NOT suitable for computing.

In that case I think you'll enjoy trying to understand the semantics of 
String in ruby 1.9 (not):
https://github.com/candlerb/string19/raw/master/string19.rb

Anyway, there was an attempt to produce a formal spec for ruby, which 
may be what you're looking for, although it seems to have gone quiet:
http://ruby-std.netlab.jp/

It was based on ruby 1.8.7.

Otherwise, I guess ruby is not the language for you. For those who need 
to write programs using formal methods or safety-critical systems I'd 
say it's definitely not. But many of us use it because ruby helps us 
write useful applications quickly and enjoyably.

-- 
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

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#4809

[Note:  parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

On Fri, May 20, 2011 at 3:25 AM, Brian Candler <b.candler@pobox.com> wrote:

>
> Otherwise, I guess ruby is not the language for you. For those who need
> to write programs using formal methods or safety-critical systems I'd
> say it's definitely not. But many of us use it because ruby helps us
> write useful applications quickly and enjoyably.
>
>
>

Why is not suitable for safety-critical systems?

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#4831

On Fri, 20 May 2011 21:34:46 +0900
Josh Cheek <josh.cheek@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, May 20, 2011 at 3:25 AM, Brian Candler <b.candler@pobox.com>
> wrote:
> 
> >
> > Otherwise, I guess ruby is not the language for you. For those who
> > need to write programs using formal methods or safety-critical
> > systems I'd say it's definitely not. But many of us use it because
> > ruby helps us write useful applications quickly and enjoyably.
> >
> 
> Why is not suitable for safety-critical systems?

For critical systems, wouldn't the language need to be very carefully
engineered?  Typesafe and all that.  This is one of the things that's
been intriguing me about Mythryl.

http://mythryl.org/



-- 
http://spiralofhope.com

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#4811

On May 16, 6:42 am, no.top.p...@gmail.com wrote:
> Can anybody point me to an on-line minimal formal
> syntax for ruby, so as to not rely on the chatty tutors.  
> We want a train-time-table format; not a novel.

matz wrote a very concise book. Ruby in a Nutshell (http://oreilly.com/
catalog/9780596002145)

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#4812

This is a very funny thread.

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