Quite possibly the strangest programming language you'll see today

September 30, 2010 2:45 AM

Pictorial Janus (SLYT)
posted by yaxu (20 comments total)

Wha.
posted by pyrex at 2:59 AM on September 30, 2010

Quite possibly the least context you'll see today.
posted by bjrn at 3:05 AM on September 30, 2010 [3 favorites]

I have no interest in knowing what that was all about. I will cherish the mystery.
posted by From Bklyn at 3:13 AM on September 30, 2010

From Bklyn posted : I have no interest in knowing what that was all about. I will cherish the mystery.

Oh FFS I hate having to explain shit to people all the fucking time but for the thickos among us...



Pictorial Janus at Paderborn is a joint effort of Marita Duecker, Christian Geiger, Ralf Hunstock, Georg Lehrenfeld, Wolfgang Mueller, and Christoph Tahedl.


posted by fullerine at 3:27 AM on September 30, 2010 [3 favorites]

Title of the post reads "Quite possibly the strangest programming language you'll see today," and a short Google brings you to this site which has more information about it.
posted by flatluigi at 4:15 AM on September 30, 2010

What we're looking at is flow vectors from three bundles (or brindles) as they would play out in an ideal distribution scenario, with only one lateral input and a single pressure source. If you'll notice, the dissipation occurs solely in a north-south (or "vertical rail" in the classical sense) pattern, which suggests the presence or absence of a solid exerting pressure from a theoretical position off to the right. The model is correct as far as it goes, but fails to include the possibility of a symmetrical port arrangement or suboptimal grounding at the point of generation or impulse. So really, it gives you an incomplete picture. But since this sort of thing is rarely done, you have to give them credit having brought visualization of this process as far as they have.
posted by Faze at 4:15 AM on September 30, 2010 [2 favorites]

*la la la la la la la la la* I can't hear you *la la la la la la la la...
posted by From Bklyn at 4:19 AM on September 30, 2010 [2 favorites]

The best part was when the cat was about to catch the little red spot from the laser pointer but instead ran into a banana cream pie!

/creating my own reality
posted by zerobyproxy at 4:36 AM on September 30, 2010

I like the part where it looks like a crazy warped uterus covered in wires
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 5:06 AM on September 30, 2010 [2 favorites]

I have no interest in knowing what that was all about. I will cherish the mystery.
posted by From Bklyn

Looked to me like gods of darkness waring in the chambers of the deep, but as it turns out it's just prog rock.
posted by nola at 5:22 AM on September 30, 2010

I'm sorry. I was here for Metafilter? I suppose I'll just leave.
posted by hwestiii at 5:46 AM on September 30, 2010

You can tell it's a research prototype, because most people still aren't programming with virtual ever-expanding omelets and stretched rabbit skins.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:55 AM on September 30, 2010

Is it Ghostbusters II?
posted by kcds at 6:27 AM on September 30, 2010

* Stands up, ascends yaxus dais, takes yaxu's fan, fans self *
posted by everichon at 7:52 AM on September 30, 2010

Visual Programming Language
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:54 AM on September 30, 2010

At first I thought it was an anus joke, and then five seconds later, I knew it wasn't and I had no idea what i was looking at.
posted by not_on_display at 1:37 PM on September 30, 2010 [1 favorite]

Sorry, I'm sort of new to this.
posted by yaxu at 2:25 PM on September 30, 2010

This is all I can find about it. yaxu, please, what the heck are we looking at?
posted by Xezlec at 8:29 PM on September 30, 2010

I don't have the book I had in front of me when I enthusiastically posted that yesterday ( http://www.amazon.co.uk/Visual-Language-Theory-Kim-Marriott/dp/0387983678 ), but as far as I can tell it's a programming language notated with topology and nothing else. You draw shapes, and how they are connected and whether they are inside each other or not somehow gives you your program. The shapes themselves don't matter, just their topology -- that is you can change all the circles etc to squares without changing the program. This strikes me as more interesting than most visual programming languages which don't seem particularly visual at all, but clearly textual programming languages with lines connecting words instead of just putting them next to each other.
Thanks for the link to that paper though Xezlec, I hadn't found that...
posted by yaxu at 3:51 AM on October 1, 2010

Watching that has squcked my thrug until all I can whupple is geep.
posted by flabdablet at 4:07 AM on October 1, 2010 [1 favorite]