Mystical
May 18, 2025 5:58 AM Subscribe
See this is why it's best to separate layout and content!
It does look nice. As per the note at the end, it's basically a type of pretty print for postscript or pseudocode. I feel like the next step is to have a ring-based input method, otherwise we're stuck typing in horizontal lines like a bunch of rubes.
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:33 AM on May 18 [1 favorite]
It does look nice. As per the note at the end, it's basically a type of pretty print for postscript or pseudocode. I feel like the next step is to have a ring-based input method, otherwise we're stuck typing in horizontal lines like a bunch of rubes.
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:33 AM on May 18 [1 favorite]
This is very beautiful. It's smart to be based on Postscript: stack based languages lend themselves well to esoteric programming and Postscript is more practical than most Forth derivatives.
There's a few other esoteric programming languages that are a little similar. Piet is the other one I know of with a graphical presentation. There's a bunch of 2d ASCII programming languages too: Befunge, Fish, Hexagony. Some more lists: Non-textual, Two-dimensional.
posted by Nelson at 8:25 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]
There's a few other esoteric programming languages that are a little similar. Piet is the other one I know of with a graphical presentation. There's a bunch of 2d ASCII programming languages too: Befunge, Fish, Hexagony. Some more lists: Non-textual, Two-dimensional.
posted by Nelson at 8:25 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]
possibly easier to read than the textual representation of Postscript — especially on a pinch-zoom-twirl tablet — I wonder what debugging it is like.
posted by clew at 10:18 AM on May 18
posted by clew at 10:18 AM on May 18
Metafilter: more practical than most Forth derivatives.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 10:50 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 10:50 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]
I love me some technoccult. Erik Davis, needs to make an updated Techgnosis!
I could see some sort of image recognition invoked to "recompile"/interpret back to postscript.
posted by symbioid at 10:52 AM on May 18
I could see some sort of image recognition invoked to "recompile"/interpret back to postscript.
posted by symbioid at 10:52 AM on May 18
Well, it's the CONCEPT of such a programming language.
To make it work you'd need to have a development environment, and it ain't going to be text. You'd absolutely need a GUI and it's one of those instances where a VR or AR type interface where you can actually grab and move things around as if they were hovering in space near you would be useful.
It'd be slow as hell to code with, that's for sure. Grab a blank circle and move it to position, grab a sigil and move it to position in the circle, draw linkages, and of course then type some anyway.
I'm not saying it's impossible, or that it'd be the worst programming language ever (brainfuck still has that covered for test examples and MUMPS for actual real world implemented horror that's deployed and in common use).
But it'd definitely be a language that was more cool looking than practical to use.
posted by sotonohito at 11:03 AM on May 18 [1 favorite]
To make it work you'd need to have a development environment, and it ain't going to be text. You'd absolutely need a GUI and it's one of those instances where a VR or AR type interface where you can actually grab and move things around as if they were hovering in space near you would be useful.
It'd be slow as hell to code with, that's for sure. Grab a blank circle and move it to position, grab a sigil and move it to position in the circle, draw linkages, and of course then type some anyway.
I'm not saying it's impossible, or that it'd be the worst programming language ever (brainfuck still has that covered for test examples and MUMPS for actual real world implemented horror that's deployed and in common use).
But it'd definitely be a language that was more cool looking than practical to use.
posted by sotonohito at 11:03 AM on May 18 [1 favorite]
It'd be slow as hell to code with
It's pretty good for the working medium. You know, programming by drawing circles on the floor with crushed bone powder and painting lines in blood.
posted by Nelson at 12:15 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
It's pretty good for the working medium. You know, programming by drawing circles on the floor with crushed bone powder and painting lines in blood.
posted by Nelson at 12:15 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
sotonohito > MUMPS for actual real world implemented horror
That prompted me to take a look, and after reading through the features and criticism subsections I have to ask: Just HOW MUCH bottom-tier bath salts were those developers smoking?
posted by Enturbulated at 1:05 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
That prompted me to take a look, and after reading through the features and criticism subsections I have to ask: Just HOW MUCH bottom-tier bath salts were those developers smoking?
posted by Enturbulated at 1:05 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
Well, the TL;DR is that it was invented in ancient times for hardware that's preposterously limited by modern standards, and it was invented by people who were not computer programmers as their primary occupation.
What baffles me is that somehow, in all the years between then and now, no one has developed an alternative that's gained any particular traction. MUMPS is the backbone of almost all medical records in the US. So... Yeah.
If Musk's DOGE boys try to use AI to "update" MUMPS code it will fail so hard that it'd be hilarious, except for all the people who'd die or suffer horrible fates due to their medical records getting messed up.
posted by sotonohito at 1:48 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
What baffles me is that somehow, in all the years between then and now, no one has developed an alternative that's gained any particular traction. MUMPS is the backbone of almost all medical records in the US. So... Yeah.
If Musk's DOGE boys try to use AI to "update" MUMPS code it will fail so hard that it'd be hilarious, except for all the people who'd die or suffer horrible fates due to their medical records getting messed up.
posted by sotonohito at 1:48 PM on May 18 [1 favorite]
Somebody please make this into a Zachtronics-style game about designing magic circles.
posted by henuani at 2:01 PM on May 18
posted by henuani at 2:01 PM on May 18
The advantage of this system is that it’s well-suited to summoning and modifying rouge General Intelligences.
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:24 PM on May 18
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:24 PM on May 18
Isn't this just another way of getting at cstross' Laundry Files technomagery?
posted by Halloween Jack at 4:27 PM on May 18 [2 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 4:27 PM on May 18 [2 favorites]
Well, he did mention that a summoning grid bore a faint resemblance to old magic circles, but most of what they did was just straight algorithmic stuff.
OTOH, in the webcomic Grrl Power, Dabbler (a demon and wizard of some skill) got into a discussion of magic with a human mage who specified that the spells they were looking at had been written in Lexica Arcanx, and Dabbler asked why not Arcanum++. The answer was that the spells predated Arcanum++ and the cost of porting them over would be more trouble than benefit at this point.
Later we see her working on a spell written in Arcanum++ and it looked like a preposterously complex magic circle. See here. Though as she notes it doesn't actually have to be circular.
Still looked pretty inconvenient to code to me.
posted by sotonohito at 4:51 PM on May 18
OTOH, in the webcomic Grrl Power, Dabbler (a demon and wizard of some skill) got into a discussion of magic with a human mage who specified that the spells they were looking at had been written in Lexica Arcanx, and Dabbler asked why not Arcanum++. The answer was that the spells predated Arcanum++ and the cost of porting them over would be more trouble than benefit at this point.
Later we see her working on a spell written in Arcanum++ and it looked like a preposterously complex magic circle. See here. Though as she notes it doesn't actually have to be circular.
Still looked pretty inconvenient to code to me.
posted by sotonohito at 4:51 PM on May 18
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posted by uphc at 6:51 AM on May 18