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Re: My WWDC/birthday wish
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Re: My WWDC/birthday wish

  • Subject: Re: My WWDC/birthday wish
  • From: Michael Grant <email@hidden>
  • Date: Wed, 21 May 2014 19:33:47 -0500
Well, what I had in mind was not so much using Siri-on-the-Mac to dictate scripts (i.e. "programming"), but giving her the ability to run spoken one- or two-line AS commands so she's not limited to the relatively circumscribed set of capabilities she has on iOS. I've fiddled with Mac voice commands once or twice but they never seemed terribly useful. Maybe I never really gave them a chance.

Michael


On Fri, May 16, 2014 at 2:53 PM, has <email@hidden> wrote:
Michael Grant wrote:

> AppleScript was designed to be "English-like". What if Siri lived in my Mac and understood spoken AppleScript commands?

Good dog, I hope not. Constructing correctly working AppleScripts with keyboard, screen, documentation, and copious trial-and-error is hurtful enough; I think building them entirely in one's head would be the quickest and easiest way to a full-on psychotic break. :p


Seriously though, most programming languages are utterly unsuitable for dictation-based use, especially by less-/non-technical users for whom voice-driven tasks would be the most natural choice. The syntax is too complicated, too punctuation-dependent; the semantics too abstract and impenetrable for most users to casually pick up. AppleScript may have an "English-like" surface veneer, but beneath that are deeply traditional roots, being spawned (via HyperTalk) largely from Pascal with an occasional Smalltalk-ism thrown in.

What you really want is something closer to Logo, which has an extremely simple syntax and semantics (it's pretty much just words and lists) and makes it really easy for users to build up their own custom vocabulary tailored to the tasks they're interested in. While Logo isn't without flaws of its own, it still stands (IMO) as the best single demonstration of how real programming - once it's stripped of the endless swathes of baroque bureaucracy and mindless BS that infests "Proper Programming Languages"[1] - ultimately boils down to a handful of key concepts simple and accessible enough they can be successfully taught to a group of eight year-olds over the course of a few hours[2]. So if a bunch of bitty brats can soak this stuff up, I daresay the a moderately interested adult Siri user would be in with at least a fighting chance.


All that said, however, I'm not sure giving ordinary users the power to customize and create their own personal experiences in whatever way they like (i.e. end-user automation) would be something Apple has any interest in supporting or promoting any more. Apple's business model nowadays is predicated on delivering a highly polished but ultimately canned user experience, with many carefully positioned revenue generation tollgates - not that there's anything wrong with that, mind - but as consumers you pays your moneys and takes your choice.

I only wish there was another platform vendor with an automation infrastructure half as good as Apple's, as messed-up, abused, and utterly unloved as it is...

Regards,

has
--
http://www.amazon.com/Learn-AppleScript-Comprehensive-Scripting-Automation/dp/1430223618


[1] Which includes supposedly "end-user friendly" languages such as AppleScript, Python, or even _javascript_ (if you believe the likes of Khan and Codecademy[3]).

[2] AKA, and not to put too fine a point on it: mainstream programming and its pedagogy today is unbelievably fucked up. It'd be tragic if it weren't so embarrassingly cringe-worthy.

[3] Which you shouldn't.

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There's really no such thing as translating. It's all a scam. We basically just make stuff up and try to make it sound plausible. 
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 >Re: My WWDC/birthday wish (From: has <email@hidden>)

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