I'm new here..



  • Sorry if this is the wrong place for a welcome thread.. I couldn't find anywhere else.

    I'm new here. I found this site a few days ago, and I decided to join because I wanted to post something in the Side Bar WTF forum.
    As for an introduction.. I'm a 12 year old programmer (VB6..) who makes too many WTFs, and enjoys reading others, so I thought it would be fun here..
    While I could not print this post out and take a picture of the printout on a wooden table, I hope my description of this can replace it ;)

     edit: Is it possible to find a less user-friendly piece of board software? I would say "The real WTF is the board software", but that is rather overused already.. Oh wait, did I say it? :O
     



  • @Treeki said:

    "The real WTF is the board software"

    Nah, the real WTF is that someone hired a 12 year old as a programmer ;)



  • @Hitsuji said:

    @Treeki said:

    "The real WTF is the board software"

    Nah, the real WTF is that someone hired a 12 year old as a programmer ;)

    Do you think that 12yo cannot program?



  • I actually don't work anywhere.. my programming is simply a hobby :)



  • @Treeki said:

    I actually don't work anywhere.. my programming is simply a hobby :)

    I think they knew that ;)

    I'm 20 years old and a hobby programmer (who even did start with VB6) too ... so anyway, welcome in the team... 



  • Can you fix my VCR?



  • @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 



  • @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    Visible Cocaine Residue

     



  • @newfweiler said:

    @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    Visible Cocaine Residue

     


     



  • @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    It's like a TiVo that uses tiny hard drives that need to be swapped out constantly and blinks 12:00 all the time. 



  • The real WTF is the people posting here...

    No, actually, the real WTF is that every second sentence across the board begins with "The real WTF is, ..."
     



  • The Real WTF is



  • The real WTF is people posting videos of rodents staring into your soul!



  • @bstorer said:

    @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    It's like a TiVo that uses tiny hard drives that need to be swapped out constantly and blinks 12:00 all the time. 

     Did you just call a video cassette small?  Are you some sort of giant?



  • @piptheGeek said:

    @bstorer said:
    @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    It's like a TiVo that uses tiny hard drives that need to be swapped out constantly and blinks 12:00 all the time. 

     Did you just call a video cassette small?  Are you some sort of giant?

    Or somebody who uses full-height 8-inch hard drives. 



  • @piptheGeek said:

    Did you just call a video cassette small?  Are you some sort of giant?


    Actually.. the word used was "tiny". Big difference between the two. My 3.5" drives are small. But in comparison, my 2GB thumb drive is tiny.

    Now that would be something.. a bunch of thumb drives packed into a VHS shell like some odd RAID configuration.



  • @piptheGeek said:

    @bstorer said:
    @CPound said:

    @RaspenJho said:

    Can you fix my VCR?

    What's a VCR? 

    It's like a TiVo that uses tiny hard drives that need to be swapped out constantly and blinks 12:00 all the time. 

     Did you just call a video cassette small?  Are you some sort of giant?

    Tiny in terms of storage.



  •  Well, we don't call it the WTForum for nothing.

    BTW I'm an 11 year old coder (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

     



  • @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 



  • @Daid said:

    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    Markup is also code. In my book anyway.

    Not programming -- not in the least -- but still, code.

    PS.
    Markup explicitly does NOT define how something looks.
    Markup gives meaning. In essence, markup is like inline metadata.



  • @dhromed said:

    @Daid said:
    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    Markup is also code. In my book anyway.

    Not programming -- not in the least -- but still, code.

    PS.
    Markup explicitly does NOT define how something looks.
    Markup gives meaning. In essence, markup is like inline metadata.

    ... then XSLT and O:XML were invented :p 



  • @PSWorx said:

    ... then XSLT and O:XML were invented :p 

    Yes, I know, but that's just like taking two stones, and merging them by pushing really really hard.

    The other day, I saw (for the first time in my life, by the way) a piece of working, reasonably-sized XSLT. A good example of XSLT, I thought. I could not believe my eyes at the utter WTF the inventor of this language committed. It's like coldfusion -- but with a W3C stamp of approval.
     



  • @dhromed said:

    It's like coldfusion -- but with a W3C stamp of approval.

    You mean they can do cold-fusion now? Why was I not informed?

     

    ... Quite probably because I could cause tremedous damage with it, but anyway... 

    Have a nice day.

    return(to_lurking); 



  • @Control_Alt_Kaboom said:

    @dhromed said:

    It's like coldfusion -- but with a W3C stamp of approval.

    You mean they can do cold-fusion now? Why was I not informed?

    Dude, cold fusion is easy. Any decent university physics lab will have a tabletop fusor around the place somewhere.



  • @PSWorx said:

    @dhromed said:
    @Daid said:
    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    Markup is also code. In my book anyway.

    Not programming -- not in the least -- but still, code.

    PS.
    Markup explicitly does NOT define how something looks.
    Markup gives meaning. In essence, markup is like inline metadata.

    ... then XSLT and O:XML were invented :p 


    And then TeX was invented in the 1970's.  In LaTeX, your markup makes explicit calls to subroutines written in TeX.  Nothing is stopping you from making your own subroutines and calling them from a document/program either.

    Don't get me started on XML and Lisp.


  • @Daid said:

    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    How come they call it HTML code then? 



  • @Mal1024 said:

    @Daid said:
    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    How come they call it HTML code then? 

     

    of course HTML code, the diffrence is the language.

     

    programming language: C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript
    markup langauge: HTML, XML, CSS

    I'm not sure if they should be called "markup language" but it sounded right in my head)


    However i would say that writing HTML,CSS or whatever does not make you a coder.
    While it may be "code" a "coder" implies someone whom writes programming source code.

    I think it's a similar difference between a painter (as in paintings) and someone whom paints your walls.
     



  • The real WTF is that this topic is still alive, for an introduction thread..



  • @stratos said:

    @Mal1024 said:
    @Daid said:
    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML). 

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks. 

    How come they call it HTML code then? 

     

    of course HTML code, the diffrence is the language.

     

    programming language: C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript
    markup langauge: HTML, XML, CSS

    I'm not sure if they should be called "markup language" but it sounded right in my head)


    However i would say that writing HTML,CSS or whatever does not make you a coder.
    While it may be "code" a "coder" implies someone whom writes programming source code.

    I think it's a similar difference between a painter (as in paintings) and someone whom paints your walls.
     


    What of TeX?  And Lisp?  XML can be trivially converted to Lisp, and vice-versa.  Indeed, XML has been used as a full-fledged Turing Complete programming language.  http://www.defmacro.org/ramblings/lisp.html

    Code is data.  Data is code.  

    HTML is "programming source code".  So is CSS.  They just call a domain specific APIs.  



  • Oh, and BTW, I've played around with BASIC and Ruby.



  • @poopdeville said:

    @stratos said:
    @Mal1024 said:
    @Daid said:
    @Mal1024 said:

    BTW I'm an 11 year old document writer (HTML, XML, XHTML).

    There you go, fixed that for ya.

    Coder is for C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript (just to name a few)

    Code describes how something works, markup (like HTML) describes how something looks.

    How come they call it HTML code then?

     

    of course HTML code, the diffrence is the language.

     

    programming language: C,C++,C#,VB,Perl,Python,PHP,Javascript
    markup langauge: HTML, XML, CSS

    I'm not sure if they should be called "markup language" but it sounded right in my head)


    However i would say that writing HTML,CSS or whatever does not make you a coder.
    While it may be "code" a "coder" implies someone whom writes programming source code.

    I think it's a similar difference between a painter (as in paintings) and someone whom paints your walls.


    What of TeX? And Lisp? XML can be trivially converted to Lisp, and vice-versa. Indeed, XML has been used as a full-fledged Turing Complete programming language. http://www.defmacro.org/ramblings/lisp.html

    Code is data. Data is code.

    HTML is "programming source code". So is CSS. They just call a domain specific APIs.

    I wouldn't count "has been used as" as a valid. While it's nice that you can use XML to implement a programming language, this does not make XML a programming language.

    You're talking turing complete, fine.

    Can XML implement a loop structure. NO*
    Can HTML implement a loop structure. NO
    can CSS implement a loop structure. NO

    * and saying you could use it as a programming language is saying like ASCII is a programming language.


    What of TeX? And Lisp?

    What about them? and what about ice cream, it's hot here you know.



  • @stratos said:

    a "coder" implies someone whom writes programming source code.

    No it doesn't.

    @stratos said:


    I think it's a similar difference between a painter (as in paintings) and someone whom paints your walls.



  • @stratos said:


      @poopdeville said:

    What of TeX? And Lisp? XML can be trivially converted to Lisp, and vice-versa. Indeed, XML has been used as a full-fledged Turing Complete programming language. http://www.defmacro.org/ramblings/lisp.html

    Code is data. Data is code.

    HTML is "programming source code". So is CSS. They just call a domain specific APIs.

    I wouldn't count "has been used as" as a valid. While it's nice that you can use XML to implement a programming language, this does not make XML a programming language.

    You're talking turing complete, fine.

    Can XML implement a loop structure. NO*
    Can HTML implement a loop structure. NO
    can CSS implement a loop structure. NO

    * and saying you could use it as a programming language is saying like ASCII is a programming language.

    It's kind of a tricky idea.  

    On the one hand, I agree with your objection.  The existence of a single dialect/schema/whatever-they're-called of XML where it's been used as a programming language does not prove my point.

    But it turns out that a trivial change to XML's syntax turns all valid XML (regardless of the schema used) into valid, executable Lisp code.  XML is "just" a verbose way to form s-expressions.  The point is, XML can implement a loop structure.  It is up to the interpreter to deal with it correctly.  A Lisp interpreter can do it trivially.

    What of TeX? And Lisp?

    What about them? and what about ice cream, it's hot here you know.


    TeX is a markup language.  It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language.  Lisp is a Turing complete programming language.  And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious.  I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags.  The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option.  That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.



  • @poopdeville said:



    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    At the very top of the page, above the place where the previous post is displayed in grey, there is a row of four tabs, one of which is "Preview".

    The real WTF is that what is shown on the Preview tab does not always match what is shown after you hit the 'Post' button. 



  • @poopdeville said:


    TeX is a markup language. It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language. Lisp is a Turing complete programming language. And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    Well, tell me what the following Lisp program will do if executed:

    '(html (xmlns <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml")</font>
         (head (title ("Hello world!")))
         (body
              (H1 ("Hello world!"))
              (A (href "http://www.thedailywtf.com") ("The Daily WTF"))
         )
    )

    What I mean is, yes, XML CAN be trivially converted to a Lisp expression. If you define a "Lisp expression" as nothing more than a tree. However, even Lisp is not turing complete in that definition, because it lacks statements for flow control (if-then, loops, etc). Those are added to Lisp via library functions. But "native" XML has no equivalent to those functions. You need additional specs on top of XML (like XSLT) to get those. Which makes XSLT a turing complete language but not XML in general.
     



  • HTML is "programming source code".  So is CSS.  They just call a domain specific APIs.

    HTML and CSS do not describe instructions to be executed one by one, not does it explicitly prescribe behaviour, and as I see it cannot be defined as "programming". What HTML and CSS do, however, is a complete state description of a tree* (ML, a hierarchical structure of objects and their properties), and of visual properties (CSS).

    ML/CSS says "I am".
    Programming says "I do".

    In both cases, you encode information (instructional or informational) using a specified grammar and syntax. Hence: coding.

    The fact that ML can be "trivially converted" to LISP does not make ML programming. It's the other way around: it exposes lisp as a data format akin to ML.

    I also still stand by my idea that any ML-programming language is a bolted-on, welded-on, glued-on, duct-taped-on, paperclipped-on misuse of the syntax.



  • @PSWorx said:

    @poopdeville said:

    TeX is a markup language. It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language. Lisp is a Turing complete programming language. And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    Well, tell me what the following Lisp program will do if executed:

    '(html (xmlns <FONT size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml")</FONT>
         (head (title ("Hello world!")))
         (body
              (H1 ("Hello world!"))
              (A (href "http://www.thedailywtf.com") ("The Daily WTF"))
         )
    )

    What I mean is, yes, XML CAN be trivially converted to a Lisp expression. If you define a "Lisp expression" as nothing more than a tree. However, even Lisp is not turing complete in that definition, because it lacks statements for flow control (if-then, loops, etc). Those are added to Lisp via library functions. But "native" XML has no equivalent to those functions. You need additional specs on top of XML (like XSLT) to get those. Which makes XSLT a turing complete language but not XML in general.
     


    That code won't do much of anything because of the single quote in front of the head node of the syntax tree.  If you drop it, the interpreter will call a function named html and recursively evaluate its arguments.  Whether those function exist or not is up to you.[1]  I'm sure you knew that.  Trick question?

    You don't need library functions to implement conditionals in Lisp.  They're usually implemented in the interpreter in C for efficiency, however.  See http://perl.plover.com/lambda/tpj.html#Logic for a sketch using the Lambda calculus.

    [1]  Compare a faulty C hello world with no include <stdio.h> statement:

    void main() {
      printf("Hello world!\n");
    }

    It's not the language's fault printf doesn't exist in main's scope.


  • Well hey it looks like this is the "young programmers introduction thread" :P


    Hi. I would say "I'm 11", but I ceased being 11 a month ago, thus putting me in the "young programmers" group instead of the "very young programmers" group.

    I know Scheme, Python, Ruby, PHP (unfortunately), C, and a little bit of Java, and a handful of random languages not worth mentioning.

    Also, I'm a mac loser and proud. Nyaah. BSD-derived in your face.



  • @poopdeville said:

    @PSWorx said:
    @poopdeville said:

    TeX is a markup language. It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language. Lisp is a Turing complete programming language. And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    Well, tell me what the following Lisp program will do if executed:

    '(html (xmlns <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml")</font>
    (head (title ("Hello world!")))
    (body
    (H1 ("Hello world!"))
    (A (href "http://www.thedailywtf.com") ("The Daily WTF"))
    )
    )

    What I mean is, yes, XML CAN be trivially converted to a Lisp expression. If you define a "Lisp expression" as nothing more than a tree. However, even Lisp is not turing complete in that definition, because it lacks statements for flow control (if-then, loops, etc). Those are added to Lisp via library functions. But "native" XML has no equivalent to those functions. You need additional specs on top of XML (like XSLT) to get those. Which makes XSLT a turing complete language but not XML in general.


    That code won't do much of anything because of the single quote in front of the head node of the syntax tree. If you drop it, the interpreter will call a function named html and recursively evaluate its arguments. Whether those function exist or not is up to you.[1] I'm sure you knew that. Trick question?

    You don't need library functions to implement conditionals in Lisp. They're usually implemented in the interpreter in C for efficiency, however. See http://perl.plover.com/lambda/tpj.html#Logic for a sketch using the Lambda calculus.

    [1] Compare a faulty C hello world with no include <stdio.h> statement:

    void main() {
    printf("Hello world!\n");
    }

    It's not the language's fault printf doesn't exist in main's scope.

     

    actually it wouldn't call a function named html and then recursively call it's arguments.

     

    It would (assuming evaluation of arguments is left to right) call xmlns with parameter <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"</font>, then it would call the function "Hello World!" and use the return as the parameter to title and use that return as the parameter to head.  Then it would call the function "Hello world!" again and use the return for the call of H1 and so on and so forth.

     Needless to say, PSWorx has no idea what he is talking about.  Lisp is Turing complete.  Common Lisp does have control flow.  Even pure lambda calculus is Turing complete.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @ehird said:

    Well hey it looks like this is the "young programmers introduction thread" :P

    Hi. I would say "I'm 11", but I ceased being 11 a month ago, thus putting me in the "young programmers" group instead of the "very young programmers" group.

    I know Scheme, Python, Ruby, PHP (unfortunately), C, and a little bit of Java, and a handful of random languages not worth mentioning.

    Also, I'm a mac loser and proud. Nyaah. BSD-derived in your face.

    You're 12, and you managed to compose a whole message using (I presume) a 101+ keyboard without using txt spk, and with punctuation and capital letters? There's something wrong with you... 



  • @tster said:

    @poopdeville said:
    @PSWorx said:
    @poopdeville said:

    TeX is a markup language. It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language. Lisp is a Turing complete programming language. And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    Well, tell me what the following Lisp program will do if executed:

    '(html (xmlns <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml")</font>
    (head (title ("Hello world!")))
    (body
    (H1 ("Hello world!"))
    (A (href "http://www.thedailywtf.com") ("The Daily WTF"))
    )
    )

    What I mean is, yes, XML CAN be trivially converted to a Lisp expression. If you define a "Lisp expression" as nothing more than a tree. However, even Lisp is not turing complete in that definition, because it lacks statements for flow control (if-then, loops, etc). Those are added to Lisp via library functions. But "native" XML has no equivalent to those functions. You need additional specs on top of XML (like XSLT) to get those. Which makes XSLT a turing complete language but not XML in general.


    That code won't do much of anything because of the single quote in front of the head node of the syntax tree. If you drop it, the interpreter will call a function named html and recursively evaluate its arguments. Whether those function exist or not is up to you.[1] I'm sure you knew that. Trick question?

    You don't need library functions to implement conditionals in Lisp. They're usually implemented in the interpreter in C for efficiency, however. See http://perl.plover.com/lambda/tpj.html#Logic for a sketch using the Lambda calculus.

    [1] Compare a faulty C hello world with no include <stdio.h> statement:

    void main() {
    printf("Hello world!\n");
    }

    It's not the language's fault printf doesn't exist in main's scope.

     

    actually it wouldn't call a function named html and then recursively call it's arguments.

     

    It would (assuming evaluation of arguments is left to right) call xmlns with parameter <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"</font>, then it would call the function "Hello World!" and use the return as the parameter to title and use that return as the parameter to head.  Then it would call the function "Hello world!" again and use the return for the call of H1 and so on and so forth.

     Needless to say, PSWorx has no idea what he is talking about.  Lisp is Turing complete.  Common Lisp does have control flow.  Even pure lambda calculus is Turing complete.

    I agree, the HTML example was kind of silly.
    Still, if you had read what I wrote below the example, you knew I never disputed that Lisp was Turing complete. I just said that a pure tree structure without any further rules and annotations is not.
    Lisp itself operates on two logical layers: On the low layer, a lisp expression is just that: An ordered tree whose leaves are strings.
    But to actually execute a lisp program, you need to get a level higher and decide which branches of the tree are statements, which are functions, which are expressions and so on. And that is done using a few "magic" string sequences and some additional rules. "if" and "lambda" are such sequences for example and "the first item of a list is the name of the function to be called" such a rule. And without them, Lisp wouldn't be Turing complete. If they are hard-wired into the compiler or not doesn't matter, what's important is that they operate a logical layer ABOVE the tree structure.
    Because this is the layer that "pure" XML is missing. This higher layer is provided by the languages that build on top of XML, like XHTML and XSLT but not by XML itself. And hence, some of the higher layer languages like XSLT ARE Turing complete. But XML itself is not.
     



  • @PSWorx said:

    @tster said:
    @poopdeville said:
    @PSWorx said:
    @poopdeville said:

    TeX is a markup language. It is a Turing complete programming language.

    XML is a markup language. Lisp is a Turing complete programming language. And XML is uninterpreted Lisp.

    And ice cream is delicious. I just hope I didn't mangle the quote tags. The Real WTF is the lack of a preview option. That and the Tags autocomplete "feature" in Safari.

    Well, tell me what the following Lisp program will do if executed:

    '(html (xmlns <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml")</font>
    (head (title ("Hello world!")))
    (body
    (H1 ("Hello world!"))
    (A (href "http://www.thedailywtf.com") ("The Daily WTF"))
    )
    )

    What I mean is, yes, XML CAN be trivially converted to a Lisp expression. If you define a "Lisp expression" as nothing more than a tree. However, even Lisp is not turing complete in that definition, because it lacks statements for flow control (if-then, loops, etc). Those are added to Lisp via library functions. But "native" XML has no equivalent to those functions. You need additional specs on top of XML (like XSLT) to get those. Which makes XSLT a turing complete language but not XML in general.


    That code won't do much of anything because of the single quote in front of the head node of the syntax tree. If you drop it, the interpreter will call a function named html and recursively evaluate its arguments. Whether those function exist or not is up to you.[1] I'm sure you knew that. Trick question?

    You don't need library functions to implement conditionals in Lisp. They're usually implemented in the interpreter in C for efficiency, however. See http://perl.plover.com/lambda/tpj.html#Logic for a sketch using the Lambda calculus.

    [1] Compare a faulty C hello world with no include <stdio.h> statement:

    void main() {
    printf("Hello world!\n");
    }

    It's not the language's fault printf doesn't exist in main's scope.

     

    actually it wouldn't call a function named html and then recursively call it's arguments.

     

    It would (assuming evaluation of arguments is left to right) call xmlns with parameter <font size="-1">"www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"</font>, then it would call the function "Hello World!" and use the return as the parameter to title and use that return as the parameter to head.  Then it would call the function "Hello world!" again and use the return for the call of H1 and so on and so forth.

     Needless to say, PSWorx has no idea what he is talking about.  Lisp is Turing complete.  Common Lisp does have control flow.  Even pure lambda calculus is Turing complete.

    I agree, the HTML example was kind of silly.
    Still, if you had read what I wrote below the example, you knew I never disputed that Lisp was Turing complete. I just said that a pure tree structure without any further rules and annotations is not.
    Lisp itself operates on two logical layers: On the low layer, a lisp expression is just that: An ordered tree whose leaves are strings.
    But to actually execute a lisp program, you need to get a level higher and decide which branches of the tree are statements, which are functions, which are expressions and so on. And that is done using a few "magic" string sequences and some additional rules. "if" and "lambda" are such sequences for example and "the first item of a list is the name of the function to be called" such a rule. And without them, Lisp wouldn't be Turing complete. If they are hard-wired into the compiler or not doesn't matter, what's important is that they operate a logical layer ABOVE the tree structure.
    Because this is the layer that "pure" XML is missing. This higher layer is provided by the languages that build on top of XML, like XHTML and XSLT but not by XML itself. And hence, some of the higher layer languages like XSLT ARE Turing complete. But XML itself is not.
     

     I see what your saying.  But basically you are just being argumentative for the sake of being argumentative.  By your argument, C is not turing complete either, it is given turing completeness by the rules associated with various syntax.  However, the argument is nonsense because C is defined by those rules just as lisp is defined by the rules that you speak of.  Now that I re-read your post, this might be what you were trying to point out, but it came off very differently the first time I read it.

    To be clear:  you are arguing that XML is not turing complete because XML does not define enough rules to be associated with it's syntax, right?
     



  • @tster said:

    But basically you are just being argumentative for the sake of being argumentative. 
    WTF?



  • @ehird said:

    Also, I'm a mac loser

    I hope you find your Mac soon.



  • @Ice^^Heat said:

    @tster said:
    But basically you are just being argumentative for the sake of being argumentative. 
    WTF?

     

    you've never heard that expression before?  He is arguing just because he likes to argue, not because he actually disagrees with something.  



  • @PJH said:

    @ehird said:
    Well hey it looks like this is the "young programmers introduction thread" :P

    Hi. I would say "I'm 11", but I ceased being 11 a month ago, thus putting me in the "young programmers" group instead of the "very young programmers" group.

    I know Scheme, Python, Ruby, PHP (unfortunately), C, and a little bit of Java, and a handful of random languages not worth mentioning.

    Also, I'm a mac loser and proud. Nyaah. BSD-derived in your face.

    You're 12, and you managed to compose a whole message using (I presume) a 101+ keyboard without using txt spk, and with punctuation and capital letters? There's something wrong with you... 

    Hi, this is from the association of 12 year olds who don't descend from AOLers.

    I'm sure you can imagine, it's a dying species.

    <IFRAME id="mce_editor_0" class="mceEditorIframe" border="0" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" width="100%" height="244px" allowtransparency="true" style="width: 100%; height: 244px; "></IFRAME>



  • @PJH said:

    @ehird said:
    Well hey it looks like this is the "young programmers introduction thread" :P

    Hi. I would say "I'm 11", but I ceased being 11 a month ago, thus putting me in the "young programmers" group instead of the "very young programmers" group.

    I know Scheme, Python, Ruby, PHP (unfortunately), C, and a little bit of Java, and a handful of random languages not worth mentioning.

    Also, I'm a mac loser and proud. Nyaah. BSD-derived in your face.

    You're 12, and you managed to compose a whole message using (I presume) a 101+ keyboard without using txt spk, and with punctuation and capital letters? There's something wrong with you... 

    Irony

    n. Having the irresistible urge to respond to this message with "QFT".



  • @tster said:

     I see what your saying.  But basically you are just being argumentative for the sake of being argumentative.  By your argument, C is not turing complete either, it is given turing completeness by the rules associated with various syntax.  However, the argument is nonsense because C is defined by those rules just as lisp is defined by the rules that you speak of.  Now that I re-read your post, this might be what you were trying to point out, but it came off very differently the first time I read it.

    I'm no native speaker, so I'm really not always expressing things the best way possible. My apologies for that :) But I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing. I'm just trying to show why poopdeville's above argumentation "Lisp is Turing complete, XML can be trivially converted to Lisp, therefore XML is Turing complete too" doesn't work. Both Lisp and C of course ARE Turing complete, because the "higher level" syntax rules are parts of both languages. But you could only "trivially convert" XML to Lisp if you leave those parts out, because XML has no equivalent for them. And then, and JUST THEN Lisp (or what remains of it) would not be Turing complete anymore.

    It's a very roundabout way of beating a dead horse though, I agree. 

    @tster said:

    To be clear:  you are arguing that XML is not turing complete because
    XML does not define enough rules to be associated with it's syntax,
    right?

    Exactly. There are such rules, but they are defined by the languages built on top of XML, not by XML itself.
     



  • @PSWorx said:

    @tster said:

    To be clear:  you are arguing that XML is not turing complete because
    XML does not define enough rules to be associated with it's syntax,
    right?

    Exactly. There are such rules, but they are defined by the languages built on top of XML, not by XML itself.
     

    OK, I agree with you completely.



  • @PSWorx said:

    @tster said:

     I see what your saying.  But basically you are just being argumentative for the sake of being argumentative.  By your argument, C is not turing complete either, it is given turing completeness by the rules associated with various syntax.  However, the argument is nonsense because C is defined by those rules just as lisp is defined by the rules that you speak of.  Now that I re-read your post, this might be what you were trying to point out, but it came off very differently the first time I read it.

    I'm no native speaker, so I'm really not always expressing things the best way possible. My apologies for that :) But I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing. I'm just trying to show why poopdeville's above argumentation "Lisp is Turing complete, XML can be trivially converted to Lisp, therefore XML is Turing complete too" doesn't work.

    The correct formulation for a proof of Turing-completeness of language X is to demonstrate that language X can either translate or simulate a language Y, where Y is known to be Turing-complete. A proof by translation involves providing a method for converting any valid program in language Y into language X, while a proof by simulation involves providing a complete implementation of an interpreter for language Y, written in language X. Nothing else is a proof of Turing-completeness. (To understand why these are the only possible proofs, you need to understand the Church-Turing thesis - it's actually a philosophical assumption about the nature of mathematics, and cannot be proven directly)

    And if you aren't doing CS research, you probably don't want to be talking about Turing-completeness. It's really not a very interesting property. For example, as noted earlier, the pure lambda calculus is Turing-complete. However, it is also semantically null - no expression in the pure lambda calculus has any meaning. We have to invent meaning in order to accomplish anything with it, and this is remarkably difficult to accomplish; it took the best mathematical minds in the world many decades to find an interpretation that was sound and consistent. All practical work is done using impure variants, and the pure form is used only to prove that the impure forms are valid. You need a great deal more than mere Turing-completeness to do anything useful.

    @tster said:

    To be clear:  you are arguing that XML is not turing complete because
    XML does not define enough rules to be associated with it's syntax,
    right?

    The real reason why XML is not Turing-complete is because it doesn't include a semantic model at all, and Turing-completeness is a property of semantic models. Asking whether XML is Turing-complete is therefore as meaningless as asking whether yellow is square.


Log in to reply