Programming Leftovers

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Nov 21, 2023

• Perl ☛ YAPC::Hiroshima 2024

• Rlang ☛ A plethora of datasets at your fingertips

  In the R-universe (new CRAN in disguise?), among other things, there’s an automated package-building workflow for all the common platforms (Linux, macOS and Windows). There’s also an open data API, whose usage underlies what’s described in this post. Remember to cite datasets’ sources. A good practice in packaging R datasets is to provide their references, but I’m guilty of not having done it everytime 😉

• [Old] Sundial Services International LLC ☛ The Lost Wisdom of COBOL

  The very earliest days of computing "were heady, indeed," as the whole world realized that "punched-card tabulators governed by wired plugboards" could be replaced by ... "software!" 😲

  Very quickly, many different computer manufacturers jumped into the ring – most of them long forgotten. Honeywell, Sperry Rand... (And one other, IBM, whose continuity is only maintained by its brand-name, not by its hardware of the time.)

  And from this came yet another realization: "that there needed to be 'a basement line.'" Above the line would be "computer programming as an abstract endeavor." Below the line would be various constantly-evolving hardware implementations. And, sitting precisely on that line, there would be a brand-new thing: "programming languages."

  Henceforth, computer programmers would not write their software in "architecture-specific" ways. Instead, they would write for standardized "architecture-abstract" models, trusting a "compiler" would exist which could translate their ideas into architecture-specific executable code on whatever platforms there might be.

  As expected, there were many initial candidates – APL, FORTH, FORTRAN, ALGOL – but one that was very decidedly different: COBOL.

• Elliot C Smith ☛ Three things that helped my side projects drag on for years.

  This year alone, I've spent months on a side project that would have once taken me a weekend. I'm glad I did, because for the longest time I waited for that perfect weekend and got nothing done. So after lots of doing nothing, then a long time making progress little by little, here's some thing that helped.

• Shell/Bash/Zsh/Ksh

  • NYC BUG ☛ Month;y Presentation on Shell Scripting

    This Tuesday. November 21, Nick Holland will give a short talk on Shell Scripting. The presentation will be at 1900 EST. Here is the URL: [...]

• Rust

  • Slashdot ☛ Rust in Linux: Maturing with Support from Cisco, Samsung, Canonical

    ZDNet shares on update on "Rust in Linux: Where we are and where we're going next," citing a talk at the Linux Plumbers Conference in Richmond, Virginia by Linux/Rust developer Miguel Ojeda