The Array Cast – A podcast about the array programming languages

an1sotropy|4 years ago

I had thought of APL as something from computing pre-history, with its bizarro custom keyboard, but I learned that APL and other array languages are apparently alive and well. Will subscribe to the podcast.

Two quotes the hosts brought up stuck with me:

(at 15:05) "A language that doesn't change the way you think is not a language worth learning". From Alan Perlis [1], and his Epigrams in Programming (#19) [2]

(at 16:49) "it is a privilege to learn a language/ a journey into the immediate". From poet Marilyn Hacker [3]; totally captivating idea, even if not not about programming languages [4]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Perlis [2] https://cpsc.yale.edu/epigrams-programming [3] https://poets.org/academy-american-poets/winner/prizes/james... [4] https://www.enotes.com/topics/marilyn-hacker/critical-essays

bidirectional|4 years ago

k (and the closely related q) is the main language used in industry, particularly at investment banks and hedge funds. It can be a bit of a shock to realise there are people in London earning in excess of £1000/day (pretty good for London) working in a language where well-written code looks like this[1]:

  us:{$[#i:&{(y~*K)&"*"~\*x}':x;@[x;i;:[;,"_"]];x]}

It's like discovering a whole different world of software development. Also I don't use that example to disparage k, I have come to appreciate the array language way-of-working. It just looks very alien.

[1] Real example found in a random script on https://nsl.com/: http://nsl.com/k9/sql.k

mlang23|4 years ago

The latest language which fits quote 1 for me was Haskell. Even though I already had some functional background (Lisp), it took me seemingly forever to actually grok purely functional programming. But once it clicked, it felt like stepping up on a ladder. My perspective on other languages changed as well.

mjburgess|4 years ago

Surprising highly production values -- programming podcasts are typically extremely poor auido with very little prep going into to them.

slver|4 years ago

These days having good video and audio quality doesn't require a lot of money. It just requires couple of hours educating yourself online what you need and how to use it.

FemmeAndroid|4 years ago

This is very exciting. I’ve been really inspired by the passion Conor Hoekstra has for APL and J. His other podcast (Algorithms + Data Structures = Programming) is a lot of fun, and his YouTube videos are very educational, but I’ve really wanted something like this where he can interact with other experts outside of the C++ world.

Instant subscribe from me.

enriquto|4 years ago

A bit sad that this interesting content is not available for audio/video impaired readers.

jasode|4 years ago

Fyi if you weren't aware ... most podcasts don't have text of the audio because high-quality (accurate) transcription of podcasts costs money. Example rates: https://www.google.com/search?q=podcast+transcription+servic...

So this thread's podcast of 52 minutes of a complex technical topic with multiple speakers could cost ~$200. A programming-related podcast is already a niche topic with a tiny audience and an Array Languages podcast is an even tinier subset of that so the cost might not be justified.

I suppose podcasts could be uploaded to Youtube and let their speech-to-text algorithm do an auto-transcribe. However, the A.I. algorithm is not good at tech topics with industry jargon/acronyms and the resultant transcription will be inaccurate.

rak1507|4 years ago

I have just finished transcribing it (quite roughly) https://gist.github.com/rak1507/3aec8c0b720e6d8a9ef121fc14e4...

tfsh|4 years ago

Chrome now provides on-device powered live captions (which hooks into any chrome originating audio) - chrome://settings/accessibility -> toggle "Live Captions"[1] which could help alleviate some of the limitations for audio impaired viewers

1: https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/10538231?hl=en

slver|4 years ago

Or patience impaired. It's a whole hour.

nulldata|4 years ago

Great first episode. I'd love to hear Aaron Hsu on this!

skipcave|4 years ago

Boxing in J

   sep=:10#.^:_1]  NB. Separate digits   
   ea=:&.> NB Perform on each

   sep ea 23 7534 322 7 24756

│2 3│7 5 3 4│3 2 2│7│2 4 7 5 6│

   #ea n NB. How many?

│2│4│3│1│5│

   +/ea n NB. Sum

│5│19│7│7│24│

   */ea n  NB. Product

│6│420│12│7│1680│

   /:~ ea n NB. Sort

│2 3│3 4 5 7│2 2 3│7│2 4 5 6 7│

not_knuth|4 years ago

This looks interesting. Can't wait to give it a listen! Has anyone already done so? Reviews?

kieckerjan|4 years ago

Nice podcast. Definitely made me want to check out APL. Again. (Disclaimer: I go through this phase every couple of years.)

RojerGS|4 years ago

I listened to the first episode and it was really interesting to listen to really experienced programmers share the things they like the most about array programming and the array-oriented languages they are most familiar with.

BlanketLogic|4 years ago

An interesting episode. Recommended.

One of the presenters is a novice with c++ background and the rest all are experts in their respective array programming languages.

rscho|4 years ago

It's good. They've got representatives of all the major array language communities among the hosts (APL, J, K/Q) plus a C++ guy.

unknown|4 years ago

[deleted]

zanethomas|4 years ago

https://github.com/abrudz/ngn-apl

chewxy|4 years ago

this seems like it's very very niche (and very specific to the niche that I am interested in!)

bidirectional|4 years ago

True, but I also feel like array programming is seen as less prevalent in industry than it really is due to a lack of online community (e.g. Haskell as a language probably has an order of magnitude more content online, let alone the functional paradigm).

In any financial centre there are hundreds of (often very well-paying) jobs using these languages (well mainly k and its ilk).

138 comments