[NBLUG/talk] ELEMENTS_of_NEW_NOW

[Steve Zimmerman]

I don't know how anyone else studies something
as recondite as Knuth, but I know how I do--I free
associate.  Since I've been doing a lot of thinking
out loud over talk at nblug anyway, and since it
has been a real rush to do so, and then to get the
responses of my comrades-in-arms, here I go again.

: )  The Zimmerman Free-Spirit License  : )

Nothing in this post be will be construed to be 
bound in any way by anything resembling,
remotely or otherwise, any status quo, nor 
will anything in this post claim to have any
practical value whatsoever.

: )      : )       : )        : )        : )        : )        : )        : )


enum ELEMENTS_of_NEW_NOW  {
	tachyonicity, 
	Linux_has_100%_share_of_ \
	all_OS_markets_PP&F,
	/* Past, Present, and Future */
}; you_dont_like_it_too_bad_it's_true;

you_dont_like_it ? too_bad_it's_true : rejoice;
	
~~~~~~~WHOOPEE!!!!!!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You think I'm kidding about &_stream3 and
tachyonicity?  Think again!

#define STDEX   &_stream3 

-------------- /* OR */----------------------

#include <stdex.h>

---------------/* OR */---------------------

MOV rL4, L_dom  ; runlevel 4, Linux dominance
MOV s3, I/O  ; stream3, Input/Output

/* 
 * Some FAQs
 *
 * What happened to streams 0 and 1?
 
 * They got put into stream3.
 * Stream3 can hold them in
 * tachyonicity.  
 *
 * Do we need to get streams 0 and 1
 * back into Input/Output?

 * They already are Input/Output.
 * We've just put Input/Output into
 * stream3.
 *
 * But what happens to "normal" I/O?

 * It stays normal, just like it is now--
 * with Linux dominance.
 *
 * What about stream 2--standard
 * error?
 *
 * Standard error is alive and well.  It is 
 * inhabited by the likes of Bjarne
 * Stroustrup and Donald Knuth.
 * Read on....
 */ 

Donald Knuth--one of the most boring
writers I've ever read.  Except for his stuff
on MMIX and MMIXAL--that I like.  If 
you're interested, try Google.  You can
download 128 pages of unpublished, new 
_TAOCP_ material, as well as his MMIX
simulator.

Anyway, as usual, it feels good to have
given up in defeat after trying to program
a random shuffle.  Code is so fascinating,
it's like poetry, but enslaving oneself to a
compiler can be hazardous to one's health.

Also, have you tried Knuth's CWEB?  You
can download that, too, from his site.  It's
kind of interesting, kind of cute.  He seems
to think it's a superior way to program--the
CWEB System of Structured Documentation--
but it's hideously complex, and the C code
that it produces is poorly formatted.
Any junior college professor would dock
a student serious points if he turned in 
code that poorly formatted, and Linus would
never use code that is that poorly formatted
in his kernel.  It's not even as good as the
GNU code, with its tiny indents and unclear
structure, and I can't
imagine the greatest programmer in the 
world--Linus Torvalds--ever using it or liking
it.  Though maybe he does, I don't know.

On the plus side, LaTex kicks ass.  That is 
a really decent piece of work.  I know, not
technically created by Knuth, but built on TeX.
Still, he's made a significant contribution on
the practical side, but I remain highly 
distrustful of his theoretical work.

I mean, look at the example of Bjarne Stroustrup.
Here's a guy who gloms on to the best 
programming language ever invented--C--and
coattails it into a supposed "improvement"--
"a better C," he calls it--C++.  Horseshit!

But, because it somehow became popular,
do I detect a presumption that this is a good
language?  C++???  Surely, you jest.

C++ is a language made for superhumans.
No reasonable person would consider a 
language that complex, a language that has
an irresistible propensity to extend itself
and its own complexity without limit, 
to be a decent language.

But it's not that C++ is just a language for
superhumans.  No!  It's a /bullshit/ language,
because it entices you to think that it's for
superhumans when, in fact, if someone really
had a superhuman IQ he would clearly 
perceive that the language is faulty through
and through.  I don't like to brag, but...well,
enough said.

And Knuth and Stroustrup are cut out of the
same cloth.  Complexity, complexity, 
complexity without limit.  What's that you say,
sir?  More complexity?  But of course, you 
are the acknowledged authority, let us make
haste to embrace further complexity!

Complexity for its own sake, perhaps?  Yes,
yes, Mr. Knuth, complexity for its own sake,
if only you give the order!  Let us make haste
to obey you, O great purveyor of complexity!

But, Mr. Knuth, what of our needs, our capacities?
We have so much complexity already.  What is
the solution?  More complexity?  Oh, sir, your
brilliance is blinding!  But of course, the answer 
all along was yet more complexity.  If only we were
as intelligent as you, 
as diligent a workman as you, and as well-read
as you, if only we, too, had as high a calling as thou
dost, Oh great Stanford Emeritus professor,
we too would have seen for ourselves
that the true answer to excessive complexity 
could only have been more complexity!  
We worship you, your Complexity.

Whew!  Didn't know I had such a Marxian
tirade in me.   : )

: )  Linux bless thee.    : )
-- 
Steve Zimmerman