The idea of using an intermediate language (often called an "interlingua") to translate text is not new. PANGLOSS is (was?) one such project, there is also at least one Japanese interlingua project (http://www.cicc.or.jp/homepage/english/about/act/ mt/mt.htm). I don't think these projects led directly to any practical application. It's a tough problem!
I don't expect UNL to succeed -- I am skeptical of any organization that has only a flowchart and a tag on their home page to show for a year of work.
What I'd like to see is an open-source project to develop an interlingua for a very specific domain (say, computer user interfaces?) that will be immediately useful. Start with just the interlingua -> human language engine, since it's a bit easier. Use it to make text for dialog boxes, menus, and help files. It won't translate Shakespeare, but it'll be useful!
Pros: Paper doesn't crash. It's light and portable. It's easily annotated. When there's more light in the room, it gets easier to read. It doesn't need recharging. You don't need MS Word to view it. You can pass out copies to your friends.
While we bicker and argue about Motif vs. Qt vs. GTK+ vs. ncurses, Microsoft weenies are still using the bloated yet ubiquitous MFC/Win32 API and still own the desktop. Is there a message here?
If you feel the need to something artistic, do shareware in your spare time (assuming you have some;-) ). I've been selling my 16-bit game, Comet Busters! for over 7 years and am still getting registrations from all over the world. It's a blast, and it's moderately profitable. All you need is a good idea -- or even a good derivative one!
Perfecting the UI is probably THE most important thing in gaining mass user acceptance of UNIX. Joe User doesn't care about whether he uses IMAP or POP3, but he does get frustrated with the total lack of UI consistency among all his apps.
But I think that throwing out X might be the wrong way to go about it. Maybe we should start from the highest level. Is there an X Application UI Style Guide document? If there were one, would it be followed?
Don't forget about formal methods, and languages like Eiffel that have more robust constructs than C++. I think GA's are good for evolving algorithms that back trucks into loading bays, but will never be used for programming-in-the-large (or the extremely large if you're Microsoft).
There are only a handful of companies -- maybe even as low as two -- that have the resources to render HTML completely enough to be considered major players in the marketplace. The Word doc format is about an order of magnitude more complex than HTML, and you don't even have the luxury of a sample implementation (or even a stable file format!) So it's unrealistic to expect any other vendor to implement the complexities and vagrancies of the format well enough to compete with Microsoft.
What's needed is an open standard for document editing/formatting/publishing/revisioning/sharing, and a freely available implementation good enough to justify moving away from Word. A tough order to fill. And please don't say "LaTex";-)
Still, as long as vendors bundle Office with every computer sold, it won't even matter what else is out there...
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The idea of using an intermediate language (often called an "interlingua") to translate text is not new. PANGLOSS is (was?) one such project, there is also at least one Japanese interlingua project (http://www.cicc.or.jp/homepage/english/about/act/ mt/mt.htm). I don't think these projects led directly to any practical application. It's a tough problem!
I don't expect UNL to succeed -- I am skeptical of any organization that has only a flowchart and a tag on their home page to show for a year of work.
What I'd like to see is an open-source project to develop an interlingua for a very specific domain (say, computer user interfaces?) that will be immediately useful. Start with just the interlingua -> human language engine, since it's a bit easier. Use it to make text for dialog boxes, menus, and help files. It won't translate Shakespeare, but it'll be useful!
Pros:
Paper doesn't crash.
It's light and portable.
It's easily annotated.
When there's more light in the room, it gets easier to read.
It doesn't need recharging.
You don't need MS Word to view it.
You can pass out copies to your friends.
Cons:
It's hard to grep paper.
While we bicker and argue about Motif vs. Qt vs. GTK+ vs. ncurses, Microsoft weenies are still using the bloated yet ubiquitous MFC/Win32 API and still own the desktop. Is there a message here?
If you feel the need to something artistic, do shareware in your spare time (assuming you have some ;-) ). I've been selling my 16-bit game, Comet Busters! for over 7 years and am still getting registrations from all over the world. It's a blast, and it's moderately profitable. All you need is a good idea -- or even a good derivative one!
Perfecting the UI is probably THE most important thing in gaining mass user acceptance of UNIX. Joe User doesn't care about whether he uses IMAP or POP3, but he does get frustrated with the total lack of UI consistency among all his apps.
But I think that throwing out X might be the wrong way to go about it. Maybe we should start from the highest level. Is there an X Application UI Style Guide document? If there were one, would it be followed?
Don't forget about formal methods, and languages like Eiffel that have more robust constructs than C++. I think GA's are good for evolving algorithms that back trucks into loading bays, but will never be used for programming-in-the-large (or the extremely large if you're Microsoft).
There are only a handful of companies -- maybe even as low as two -- that have the resources to render HTML completely enough to be considered major players in the marketplace. The Word doc format is about an order of magnitude more complex than HTML, and you don't even have the luxury of a sample implementation (or even a stable file format!) So it's unrealistic to expect any other vendor to implement the complexities and vagrancies of the format well enough to compete with Microsoft.
, and a freely available implementation good enough to justify moving away from Word. A tough order to fill. And please don't say "LaTex" ;-)
What's needed is an open standard for document editing/formatting/publishing/revisioning/sharing
Still, as long as vendors bundle Office with every computer sold, it won't even matter what else is out there...