Fred2834 wrote:

I would not want a very long hash table to be described without any special character. In the real world, large XML or JSON files are a reality.

I would. If i had to enter/edit the data manually, then i would want a long hash table to be described without any special character. I had to achieve exactly that with a new Javascript tool i created. I had to figure out a way to store human-editable data in html -- ie, plain text. So, no formatting, no tabular display. Here's my solution. It uses no special characters at all, no tags, and unlike XML/JSON the fieldnames aren't repeated for every record. I find this quite readable. It's optimized for low-risk editing. There are no syntax to screw up or special symbols to put in the wrong place, no punctuation to get wrong. And it's far less laborious without having to type all those tags or braces.

	NAME
	LINK
	DESCRIPTION

	Genevieve Dupre
	https://www.genevievetattoos.com
	This isn't what you expected.

	Joey Armstrong
	https://thunderhandtattoo.com
	The most amazing.

GitHub - johnaweiss/HTML-Micro-Templating: Lightweight, robust HTML templating system.[^] Granted, this would quickly become unwieldy with a lot of fields. The solution above isn't intended for data with a ton of fields. But if i had a lot of fields, then i wouldn't be manually editing raw data in plain text format. Dude, why are you doing that? XML/JSON are best suited for machine manipulation, not human reading/editing. But this thread is about human readable languages, not machine languages. So i'm unclear how your XML/JSON contradicts my desire for human-readable code.

https://github.com/johnaweiss?tab=repositories

Member 14564709 wrote:

Unfortunately BASIC has been all but killed off because it scared the crap out of the C guys.

i like your thinking. Plz check out my git. https://github.com/contextual-project/contextual.js/wiki

Kirk 10389821 wrote:

If I gave you your "perfectly" concise language, without a bunch of caveats, like no libraries, no classes, no protocol support. Would you want to use it? If you had to implement AES, SMTP, HTTP, etc

i never said anything about eliminating libraries, classes, or protocol support.

Member 7989122 wrote:

I think of it more at a concept level rather than saving typing. Avoid reduncancy. Avoid tokens that serve no purpose. Remove clutter.

Both are important to me. In the end, we still have to type. i like your thinking. Please check out my git. If you like it, please join the project! Homepage: https://github.com/contextual-project/contextual.js More examples: https://github.com/contextual-project/contextual.js/wiki

James Curran wrote:

I would say you rewrite fails the "Human understandable" test, as because my understanding of your code is quite different than what the original javascript does.

You're interpreting "human readable" to mean "js-programmer readable". That's not what i mean. My rewrite throws out much js syntax, and can't be interpreted through a js lens. It's a different language.

For anyone interested, i created a git project with more description of the fantasy language, and several examples of how the hypothetical language would look. If you like it, please join the project! Homepage: https://github.com/contextual-project/contextual.js More examples: https://github.com/contextual-project/contextual.js/wiki

Quote:

The major problem with your idea is "Human understandable" you didn't define the audience

But i did define it:

Quote:

By "human-understandable", i DON'T mean "natural language" or "sounds like spoken English". I mean, provided you have learned the special programming syntax, and that learning that syntax is no more challenging or time-consuming than learning, say, Python.

The audience is people who have learned the special programming syntax.

Here's my fantasy rewrite of some Javascript. Which one do you find more understandable? Which one's function and structure is more instantly obvious? Be honest. JS

var home = {
cit : "Boston",
get City () {
return this.cit;
},
set City(val) {
this.cit = val;
}
};

Fantasy Rewrite

home
City 'Boston'

That's sort of what i'm looking for. Notice the lack of punctuation. Notice judicious use of whitespace as syntax. Notice how the getter, setter, variable, and default value are all encapsulated into two words. What language is like that?

What's "Human understandable"?

I mean, easy to understand at a glance. Here's Game of Life in APL. Extremely concise! And totally NOT human-understandable.

{≢⍸⍵}⌺3 3∊¨3+0,¨⊢

Here's the Whitespace language. Extremely concise, and totally NOT human-understandable. Seeking characters found on a normal keyboard.

By "human-understandable", i DON'T mean "natural language" or "sounds like spoken English". I mean, provided you have learned the special programming syntax, and that learning that syntax is no more challenging or time-consuming than learning, say, Python.

What's "Concise"?

Here's some COBOL. Very human understandable. But not concise:

ADD YEARS TO AGE.
MULTIPLY PRICE BY QUANTITY GIVING COST.
SUBTRACT DISCOUNT FROM COST GIVING FINAL-COST.

What's "Practical"

By "practical" i mean, it's a wise choice for real-world programming. Ie, not just an academic experiment. It has community, tools, rich programming features.... things a language needs to be usable for real projects.