Post · bonfire.mavnn.eu

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

I'm teaching our grad intro PL course for the first time (!) starting this Friday, and I'm gonna do it *my* way, and I'm both scared and excited. It's going to be a *lot* of work. For me, I mean. (And possibly for them! But definitely for me.)

Get ready to read some motherfucking TAPL! There's gonna be some Mike Hicks blog posts from 2015 up in this bitch! Wadler and Blott 1989? You know it! The "From System F to Typed Assembly Language" paper? Abso-fucking-lutely we will

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Guilherme Espada

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey I've been looking for a specific talk that has the phrase "secret agent Mike hicks" in it. I also remember it had some code editor with some polygons, and when you moved the polygons it updated the code.

Do you happen to know which talk this is?

Guilherme Espada

@[email protected] last mo.

@lindsey Found it! https://youtu.be/1gGd7pKSpRM?t=360

@[email protected] last mo.

@GUIpsp Amazing. Ravi was also one of our keynote speakers at the Haskell Symposium a few weeks ago! It was a great talk. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHEBNdOIMHk&list=PLZyRtqt_fXoU&index=13

[Haskell'26] The Next 700 Block-Based Editors (Keynote)

@[email protected] last mo.

@GUIpsp Incidentally, Agent Hicks (https://mhicks.me/) recently relocated to UPenn, so he is no longer strategically located near the nation's capital. I can only assume this is a deep cover operation

Michael Hicks

I am the Cecilia Fitler Moore Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Computer and Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania, and the Director of its [Schlein Center for Cybersecurity](https://cybersecurity.seas.upenn.edu). I am also an [Amazon Scholar](https://www.amazon.science/scholars).

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey “From System F to Typed Assembly Language” — ooh, I didn’t know about this one, thanks!

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

Are we gonna REGARD THE PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE AS HAVING A CENTRAL PLACE IN SOLVING COMPUTING PROBLEMS? HELL YES WE WILL. And are we gonna REASON ABOUT SOFTWARE BEHAVIOR IN A RIGOROUS AND GENERAL WAY? You're goddamn RIGHT we are, because it's fucking AWESOME that we can do that. Is it actually SICK AS HELL that closures are encoded as TAL-level abstractions using motherfucking existential types? YES IT IS, and in ten weeks from now, you're gonna understand WHY it's sick as hell

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey This feels like a Baptist Revival Sermon, circa 1956! DOGDAMN!

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey *nods sagely, and in teaching faculty voice reflects* “students will understand why that’s sick as hell” falls under both the “Conceptual” and “Metacognitive” dimensions of knowledge when developing learning goals under Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

Will we REASON ABOUT WHAT PROGRAMS MEAN IN A FORMAL SENSE and GAIN FAMILIARITY WITH CERTAIN WIDELY USED TECHNIQUES for doing so? HELL YES WE WILL. Will we be ESPECIALLY interested in PROGRAMS that OPERATE ON PROGRAMS? Of course we will, because THAT SHIT IS INTERESTING AS FUCK. Will we then ADOPT A VIEWPOINT that will reveal PROGRAMS THAT OPERATE ON PROGRAMS to us EVERYWHERE WE LOOK? Will MANY COMPUTING PROBLEMS begin to take the shape of LANGUAGE DESIGN problems? I SURE AS FUCK HOPE SO!

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

Will we then begin to regard OURSELVES as the LANGUAGE DESIGNERS and IMPLEMENTORS we have ALWAYS BEEN? Will we then be EMPOWERED to AVOID COMMON PITFALLS and MAKE MORE INTENTIONAL CHOICES the next time we find ourselves DESIGNING and IMPLEMENTING LANGUAGES, now that we KNOW THAT THAT IS IN FACT WHAT WE ARE DOING? And, will we APPRECIATE OTHERS' THOUGHTFUL DESIGNS ALL THE MORE, and be able to GET THE MOST OUT OF THEM? FUCK YES. FUCK YES WE WILL.

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

Oh, yeah, and in addition to being HYPE AS FUCK about PL, we're also motherfucking SCHOLARS, so we're going to ATTRIBUTE our fucking SOURCES. Because we're standing on the shoulders of motherfucking GIANTS.

"REGARD THE PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE AS HAVING A CENTRAL PLACE IN SOLVING COMPUTING PROBLEMS" and "REASON ABOUT SOFTWARE BEHAVIOR IN A RIGOROUS AND GENERAL WAY" are both almost direct quotes from this Mike Hicks blog post, "What is PL research and how is it useful?": http://www.pl-enthusiast.net/2015/05/27/what-is-pl-research-and-how-is-it-useful/

But the main point I want to make is that PL research is broader than designing and implementing new languages. To me, a PL researcher is someone who views the programming language as having a central place in solving computing problems. From this vantage point, PL researchers tend to focus on developing general abstractions, or building blocks, for solving problems, or classes of problems. PL research also considers software behavior in a rigorous and general way, e.g., to prove that (classes of) programs enjoy properties we want, and/or eschew properties we don't. This approach has proven to be very valuable for solving a wide ranging set of problems.

The Programming Languages Enthusiast

What is PL research and how is it useful? - The PL Enthusiast

This article looks at what PL research is, at least in part, and why it is effective.

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@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey Change the wording slightly to STUDENT WILL BE ABLE TO FUCKING DESIGN AND IMPLEMENT A FUCKING PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE and you're now following the template of a typical high school lesson plan.

Chung-chieh Shan 單中杰

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey Yes... Ha ha ha... YES!

chris mort💀ens

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey link to syllabus is going to point to this thread right

Your weary 'net denizen

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey Wow! I really wish I was taking this class!

(Well, to be precise, I wish I had the prerequisite knowledge, and then I wish I was taking this class. 😆 )

Christina Richards

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey I want to have this course’s babies

yomimono, still on earth

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey God DAMN you got me READY TO REASON

Meven Lennon-Bertrand

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey I'm suddenly so pumped

@mavnn 2 mo. ago

@[email protected] Is there an online sign up for just this course?! PL (and the world, frankly) is badly in need of wild enthusiam directed by knowledgeable intent and tempered in the fires of historical examples, and I for one would be so on board that train

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Conor Titania Mc Bride

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey There is so much joy to be had in DOING THINGS DELIBERATELY.

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@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

Now you make me wish I could follow your series of lectures online.

Lars Hupel :verified:

@[email protected] 2 mo. ago

@lindsey the PL class I wish I had