Voronoi indexes (was philisophical /UnRebolish /Interleave)
[1/2] from: webdev::accglobal::net at: 27-Sep-2000 0:21
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This is Not Rebol specific.
Spatial indexing using voronoi tesselations.
Sensing an interest by some of the list members in this subject matter as
well as its' possible trancendence into a Rebol application...
If you are interested in the practical and theoretical aspects of spatial
indexing and related geometry then go visit: http://voronoi.com/
The subject matter applies to many disciplines that have a significant
spatial aspect such as chemistry, medicine, imaging, and geography to name
but a few. It makes for a much more stimulating intellectual fare than Bill
Gates latest bid for world domination or why Rebol has not been ported to my
lavatory appliances.
Enjoy...
----- Original Message -----
From: <[joel--neely--fedex--com]>
To: <[list--rebol--com]>
Sent: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 9:15 AM
Subject: [REBOL] Re: Philosophical (was "UnRebolish") commentary
> > [webdev--accglobal--net] wrote:
> > ... Do not
<<quoted lines omitted: 93>>
> to think of Edsger!
> -jn-
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>This is Not Rebol specific.<BR>Spatial indexing
using voronoi tesselations.<BR>Sensing an interest by some of the list members
in this subject matter as<BR>well as its' possible trancendence into a Rebol
application...<BR><BR>If you are interested in the practical and theoretical
aspects of spatial<BR>indexing and related geometry then go visit: <A
href="http://voronoi.com/">http://voronoi.com/</A><BR>The subject matter applies
to many disciplines that have a significant<BR>spatial aspect such as chemistry,
medicine, imaging, and geography to name<BR>but a few. It makes for a much more
stimulating intellectual fare than Bill<BR>Gates latest bid for world domination
or why Rebol has not been ported to my<BR>lavatory
appliances.<BR><BR>Enjoy...<BR><BR>----- Original Message -----<BR>From: <<A
href="mailto:[joel--neely--fedex--com]">[joel--neely--fedex--com]</A>><BR>To: <<A
href="mailto:[list--rebol--com]">[list--rebol--com]</A>><BR>Sent: Tuesday, September
26, 2000 9:15 AM<BR>Subject: [REBOL] Re: Philosophical (was UnRebolish
)
commentary<BR><BR><BR>> > <A
href="mailto:[webdev--accglobal--net]">[webdev--accglobal--net]</A> wrote:<BR>> >
... Do not<BR>> > attempt to do anything more serious than a napkin sketch
of this<BR>> > method without the supervision of an adult or perhaps an
attending<BR>> > physician unless you wish to go numerically mad with
something akin to<BR>> > a division by zero.<BR>>
><BR>><BR>>
ROTFL!<BR>><BR>> ><BR>> > Thanks for the feedback, ...<BR>>
><BR>><BR>> Thanks for the question!<BR>><BR>>
><BR>> >
it was most enlightening and informative.<BR>> ><BR>><BR>> .. and
fun! AFAIAC, it provided a welcome break from a very<BR>> frustrating
network infrastructure problem. Also, by concidence,<BR>> it arrived
the same day I found the following link:<BR>><BR>>
<A
href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/">http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/</A><BR>><BR>>
to a page bearing the
title<BR>><BR>> In Pursuit
of
Simplicity<BR>>
the manuscripts
of<BR>> Edsger W.
Dijkstra<BR>><BR>> [If you don't want to bother with reading the remainder
of this<BR>> note, please feel free to skip it. But PLEASE don't
skip the<BR>> opportunity to look through the collection of papers
under the<BR>> above page!]<BR>><BR>><BR>> For those who've
had the pleasure of reading his EWD series, this<BR>> site is a MAJOR
treat. Dijkstra is a world-class thinker and<BR>> writer in computing
science whose entire career is been marked<BR>> by the pursuit of simplicity
and elegance in the description and<BR>> design of algorithms and
proofs.<BR>><BR>> Although his writings are off the beaten track, and
though he<BR>> uses his own notation for some things, and though he can be
very<BR>> intellectually demanding (all of which remind me of REBOL),<BR>>
almost everything he has written has hidden rewards to the reader<BR>> who is
patient enough to work through it.<BR>><BR>><BR>> His contributions to
programming include such crown jewels as:<BR>><BR>> * invention of the
semaphore
, now widely used as a means of<BR>> synchronizing
concurrent threads/processes,<BR>><BR>> * the eponymous algorithm for
finding the shortest path<BR>> between two points in a
graph,<BR>><BR>> * the first clear description of using a stack to
support<BR>> procedure scoping/entry/exit (created during
early<BR>> implementation efforts for Algol 60!),<BR>><BR>>
* a lovely, minimalist, nondeterministic programming
notation<BR>> used for the design and proof of programs (a small
part of<BR>> which I implemented in REBOL a few months back with
great<BR>> assistance from the members of this list -- the EWD/if
and<BR>> EWD/do selection and iteration
structures).<BR>><BR>> He is probably best known to the larger programming
community<BR>> as the author of the letter published under the title,<BR>>
go to Considered Harmful
in the Communications of the ACM,<BR>> which (for
good or ill) is usually credited as the spark that<BR>> ignited the
structured programming
movement (although he should<BR>> not be blamed for
all of the things that have been done under the<BR>> cover of that
banner!)<BR>><BR>><BR>> His career-long pursuit of beauty as a prime
criterion of quality<BR>> in programming strikes me as wholly aligned with
what I perceive<BR>> as "the spirit of REBOL" (and I'm not saying that just
to<BR>> achieve ob-REBOL-relevance ;-) In particular, let me
recommend<BR>> that you give a close (and patient! ;-) reading
to<BR>><BR>> <A
href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/MCReps/MR34.PDF">http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/MCReps/MR34.PDF</A><BR>><BR>>
which -- although written in 1961 (!) -- states forcefully that<BR>> it is
the responsibility of a programming language to assist<BR>> the programmer in
clearly stating reliable algorithms, and that<BR>> this responsibility is
more fundamental than simply minimizing<BR>> CPU cycles or memory
bytes. [Over-simplified araphrase, and any<BR>> errors therein, are my
fault.]<BR>><BR>> Dijkstra's forceful, uncomprimising, artistic
personality and<BR>> attitude appear almost quixotic (in the fullest sense!
;-),<BR>> especially when he tackles none-too-subtly the behavior of<BR>>
IBM (the Microsoft of the 60s and 70s). His article entitled,<BR>> "How
do we tell truths that might hurt?", available
at<BR>><BR>> <A
href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd04xx/EWD498.PDF">http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd04xx/EWD498.PDF</A><BR>><BR>>
(from 1975) is a collection of pointed sayings
including:<BR>><BR>> "The problems of business
administration in general<BR>> and data base
management in particular are much too<BR>>
difficult for people that think in IBMerese,
com-<BR>> pounded with sloppy
English."<BR>><BR>> "Many companies that have made
themselves dependent<BR>> on IBM-equipment (and
in doing so have sold their<BR>> soul to the
devil) will collapse under the sheer<BR>>
weight of the unmastered complexity of their
data<BR>> processing systems."<BR>><BR>>
and (the last quotation -- I promise!) one that deserves to<BR>> be tatooed
on the forehead of every programmer (and inside<BR>> the eyelids of every
programming language designer!)<BR>><BR>> The
tools we use have a profound (and
devious!)<BR>> influence on our thinking
habits, and, therefore,<BR>> on our thinking
abilities.
<BR>><BR>> The experience of over 25 years' of exposure to
Dijkstra's ideas<BR>> is one of the most fundamental reasons why I appreciate
REBOL as<BR>> much as I do -- and probably also why I sometimes come off
as<BR>> such a curmudgeon! I'd be flattered if either caused
someone<BR>> to think of Edsger!<BR>><BR>>
-jn-<BR>><BR>><BR></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>
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[2/2] from: joel:neely:fedex at: 27-Sep-2000 8:09
> [webdev--accglobal--net] wrote:
> This is Not Rebol specific.
<<quoted lines omitted: 5>>
> of spatial indexing and related geometry then go visit:
> http://voronoi.com/
Thanks! I've forwarded the reference on to a collegue of
mine who is interested in that very thing!
-jn-
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