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Various tweaks, including reference improvements
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‎AI/AI-and-Coding.xml

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@@ -27,5 +27,10 @@ at. However, a ticketing system is just (you guessed it) a set of tables. So
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it'd be useful to have a system like this in a table-oriented RAD environment,
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so that we could put useful interfaces on it. </p>
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<p>No doubt this ties in with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent-oriented_programming">
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Agent-Oriented Programming</a>, which is a revamped iteration of the
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actor_model">Actor Model</a>; event-driven
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programming also ties in here to a certain extent. </p>
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</content>
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</page>

‎Other-Items/History-of-Programming.xml

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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
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<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="../../interface/layout.xsl"?>
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<page>
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<filename>History-of-Programming.xml</filename>
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<sitedir>Other-Items</sitedir>
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<content>
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<div class="blockquote">
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The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be;
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and that which is done is that which shall be done:
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and there is no new thing under the sun.
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<div class="reference">
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<i><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+1&amp;version=KJV#en-KJV-17325">
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Ecclesiasties 1:9</a>, King James authorised translation of the Bible,
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translated 1611 (revised 1769), from the Hebrew manuscript, originating around 900BC</i>
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</div>
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</div>
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<p>This is a fairly focussed history of programming. Its purposes are:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>To help people distinguish OOP from Agent-Oriented Programming, which
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has often been called OOP as well, but is really a somewhat separate
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paradigm</li>
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<li>To help people see the reinvention of old ideas under new names</li>
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</ul>
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<p>In some of the eras below, people often thought they had invented a new
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thing, when really they were just reinventing something older. </p>
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<style>
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td {
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vertical-align: top;
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}
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td h4 {
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margin-top: 0;
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}
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</style>
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<table>
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<tr>
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<th>Era</th>
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<th>Years</th>
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<th>Object-Oriented Programming</th>
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<th>Agent-oriented Programming</th>
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<th>Table-Oriented Programming</th>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>Definition</th>
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<td></td>
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<td>The Imperative-style OOP that is mostly used in modern-day languages</td>
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<td>aka Message-passing OOP; see
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<a href="http://stereobooster.github.io/two-big-schools-of-object-oriented-programming">
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Two big schools of Object-Oriented Programming</a> for details</td>
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<td></td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>Mainframe Era</th>
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<td>1960s-1980</td>
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<td colspan="2">
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<h4>The Common Era</h4>
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<p>In 1963, Ivan Sutherland's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sketchpad">
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Sketchpad</a> was effectively the earliest object-oriented program,
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though its use of terminology isn't what we'd expect today. However,
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it wasn't written in an object-oriented language. </p>
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<p>Object-Oriented Programming began in 1967 with the creation of Simula
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by Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard. This introduced classes, objects,
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inheritance, and polymorphism, and also the Actor model (cf.
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Actor_model">
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History of the Actor model</a>). </p>
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<p>Alan Kay's Smalltalk in 1972 was considered widely influential in
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Object-oriented circles, and continued the use of the Actor Model.</p>
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</td>
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<td>
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<h4>Decision Table Programming</h4>
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<p>The earliest iteration I found of table-oriented programming is the paper
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<a href="https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2006/P2608-1.pdf">
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What is DETAB-X?</a> published by Solomon L. Pollack in October 1962. It
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details DETAB, a table-oriented variant of COBOL. </p>
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<p>This led to languages such as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filetab">
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Filetab</a> in the late 60s, whose descendents continued in the 70s and 80s,
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and a Linux version was even released in 2001. The company owning Filetab
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was liquidated in 2010. </p>
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<p>This early iteration is often labelled
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_table">Decision Table</a>
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programming. </p>
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</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>PC Era</th>
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<td>1980-1995</td>
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<td>It was during this era that Object-Oriented Programming came into the
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mainstream. This had two effects; the first was that
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it brought larger encapsulation to the mainstream, replacing to a
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certain extent the old Procedural methodology. The second was that this
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also resulted in dropping the Actor model and message passing, not
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because there was anything inherently wrong with them, but because they
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weren't suited to the minds of those strongly influenced by procedural
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(or, for that matter, functional) programming. This was the era of CLOS
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and C++. </td>
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<td>During this era, message-passing OOP was somewhat sidelined by
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imperative-style OOP. However, this was also the era in which the early
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work on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent-oriented_programming">
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Agent-Oriented Programming</a> was done. </td>
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<td>
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<h4>Data-Oriented Programming</h4>
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<p>The Term "Data-oriented Programming" has been used in various ways around
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the web, but the one we're using here is the one on Wikipedia about
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_programming_languages_by_type#Data-oriented_languages">
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Data-oriented languages</a>. These seem to be divided into table and tree
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types, but the common theme is a close integration with a database, rather
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than keeping it at arm's length as SQL-using systems do (but PL/SQL, or even
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SQL, would be an example of Data-oriented Programming). </p>
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<p>Popularity of the table branch of data-oriented programming surged in the
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80s with the use of languages like:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>dBase</li>
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<li>Clipper</li>
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<li>Harbour/xHarbour (Open Source)</li>
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<li>Visual FoxPro/Microsoft FoxPro</li>
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</ul>
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<p>These languages had useful features that are not seen in modern programming
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languages, primarily the tight integration of database features into the
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language. </p>
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</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>Web 1.0 Era</th>
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<td>1995-2008</td>
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<td><h4>Take over the world</h4>
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This was the era in which Imperative OOP took over the world. While
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the model of OOP wasn't necessarily agreed on, most languages incorporated
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a lot more OOP than previously. </td>
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<td>While some variants of agent-
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oriented programming lean more towards logic programming (eg.
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GOAL_agent_programming_language">
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GOAL</a>, others are definitely in line with the Actor Model (eg.
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SARL_(programming_language)">
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SARL</a>. </td>
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<td>
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<h4>Table-Oriented Programming</h4>
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<p>With the advent of the internet, and the popularity of Object-Oriented
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Programming, these languages fell out of use. </p>
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<p>In 1998-2002, as the table-oriented languages were falling out of use,
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Tablizer/TOPMind (aka Tablizer/TOPMind) wrote a series of articles
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on "Table-Oriented Programming" (TOP). These were, in their own words,
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unstructured and piecemeal. These advocated for various features prevalent in
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these languages, and a few ideas of their own. </p>
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<p>Unfortunately, at the time, TOP was seen (especially by the biggest TOP
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advocate, Tablizer/TOPMind/TOPMind) as a competitor to OOP. This meant he spent a lot
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of time criticising the OOP community (often validly) for the weaknesses of OOP
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(and OOP was weak before modern ideas such as the invention of roles). </p>
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<p>This led to a situation where the vast majority of people followed the OOP
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camp, without considering a multi-paradigm approach. Had more effort been put
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into integrating TOP into modern programming languages, everyone's lives
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would've been a lot easier (or at least most programmers). </p>
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</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>Web 2.0 Era</th>
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<td>2008-2022</td>
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<td>This was a time of steadily increasing object orientation in some of
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the less structured languages. </td>
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<td></td>
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<td>
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<h4>The Interregnum</h4>
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<p>As a part of the interregnum, Table-Oriented Programming was pushed
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into the database, but then the common methodology was that code was
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moved out of the database, mainly for efficiency/scalability reasons
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(though the Smart DB/Thick DB people argue that this was often just
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a case of bad programmers). This meant that it was no longer easy
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to put code in the tables. </p>
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</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<th>AI Era</th>
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<td>2022+</td>
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<td></td>
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<td>Look what's going to flourish! There are now many agent-based systems,
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though few have a genuine agent-based programming language to go with
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them. </td>
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<td>
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<h4>Rebirth</h4>
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<p>This site is an attempt to make use of the good parts of TOP while hopefully
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leaving behind the oppositional nature of previous discourse on the topic;
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there may still be some pointing out of the weaknesses of various technologies,
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but only with the intent of showing the power of multi-paradigm programming, not
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with the intent of making anyone abandon the named technologies.</p>
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<p>I will consider this a success if more languages adopt table-oriented
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programming as one of their available paradigms. </p>
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</td>
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</tr>
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</table>
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<p>As a side note, there's some similarity between Agent-Oriented Programming
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and Dataflow programming, but Dataflow programming is more aimed at a
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continuous flow of data through a few main streams, rather than message
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passing. While the concepts are similar, the mindsets are different. </p>
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<p>It can also be seen by examining the history of programming that a lot of
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effort has been expended simply trying to drag programmers further away from
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the procedural model and C. C++ was the inclusion of OOP in C, but only the Classes
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part, not the Actor Model part. Perl was the inclusion of some Functional
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features in a C-like language; its successors (Ruby, Python, PHP) were usually
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less functional-aligned. </p>
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</content>
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</page>

‎Other-Items/real-sitemap.xml

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<section>
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<title>Other Material</title>
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<link name="Zealot-Oriented Programming" href="Other-Items/Zealot-Oriented-Programming/"/>
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<link name="History of Programming" href="Other-Items/History-of-Programming.xml" width="huge"/>
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<!-- link title="English Analysis" href="Other-Items/English-Analysis.xml" width="huge"/ -->
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</section>
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<!--menu>
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<menuitem name="" href=""/>
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<menuitem name="" href=""/>
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</menu -->
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</sitemap>
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</sitemap>

‎RAD/Program-Editors.xml

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<li>Format: Is it CSV, HTML, JSON, binary, etc</li>
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</ul>
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<p>This will tie in well with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actor_model">
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Actor Model</a> of OOP -- see <a href="http://stereobooster.github.io/two-big-schools-of-object-oriented-programming">
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Two big schools of Object-Oriented Programming</a> for more information. </p>
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</content>
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</page>

‎Raku-TOP/Operators/index.xml

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<td>Include all of the rows in both relations, matching up where possible</td>
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</tr>
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<tr><th colspan="3"><h3>Other</h3></th></tr>
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<tr><th colspan="3"><h3>Other Join Operators</h3></th></tr>
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<tr>
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<td></td>
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<td>▷=◁</td>
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<td>Equjoin</td>
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<td>Like an inner join, but the only comparison allowed is the <code>=</code> sign</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<td></td>
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<td>Natural</td>
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<td>≜ U+225C</td>
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<td>Natural Join</td>
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<td>Like Equijoin, but the column names have to be the same in both tables</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>

‎Raku-TOP/Relation/Relation.xml

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<p>Note that the ordering above is derived from the following. </p>
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<h5>Select Stages</h5>
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<h3 id="Select-Stages">Select Stages</h3>
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<table>
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<tr>

‎TOP-content.css

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margin-bottom: 5pt;
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}
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.references-reference {
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font-size: -10%;
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margin: 0 10pt;
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}
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table {
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margin: auto;
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}
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padding-left: 10pt;
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}
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th h2, th h3 {
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th h2, th h3, th h4 {
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margin: 0px;
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}
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code.block {
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display: block;
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overflow-y: scroll;
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padding: 4pt;
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padding: 10pt;
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border: 1px solid #cccccc;
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}
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.blockquote .sidebar {
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/* Code for CSS hover text */
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.hover-parent {
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position: relative;
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display: inline;
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}
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display: none;
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width: 400px;
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margin-left: 36pt;
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margin-top: -14pt;
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left: 10pt;
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top: 0pt;
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border: 2px solid var(--blockquote-border-color);
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border-radius: 4pt;
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padding: 10px;

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