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Re:The sad state of sysadmin in the age of containers (2015) by dozzie on Wednesday May 16, 2018 @06:21PM (#17086952)
> it's based on a kind of maths called "promise theory"

Promise theory is not math, despite its name. It doesn't predict anything, it doesn't explain any phenomena. It's an architectural approach. Brilliant, led to a really great software (CFEngine), but it's not "maths".

Re:The sad state of sysadmin in the age of containers (2015) by atsaloli on Wednesday May 16, 2018 @07:02PM (#17087162)
Basic concepts of promise theory (10 minute video by Mark Burgess who came up with it): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TPsB5WuZgk

2014 introductory article: https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/promise-theory—what-it

Basic book on the subject: https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Promises-Designing-Systems-C...

It's not "maths" like arithmentic but it's "maths" like graph theory:

Promise Theory, in the context of information science, is a model of voluntary cooperation between individual, autonomous actors or agents who publish their intentions to one another in the form of promises. It is a form of labelled graph theory, describing discrete networks of agents joined by the unilateral promises they make.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promise_theory

Re:The sad state of sysadmin in the age of containers (2015) by dozzie on Thursday May 17, 2018 @02:50PM (#17094268)
> It's not "maths" like arithmentic but it's "maths" like graph theory

It's less like graph theory and more like inversion of control: an architecture, not a set of theorems and their proofs. Even Burgess' own book you mentioned is nothing like a mathematical handbook.

I'm a great fan of Mark Burgess and his promise theory, but calling it a mathematical theory or a mathematical domain is simply incorrect.

Re:The sad state of sysadmin in the age of containers (2015) by atsaloli on Friday May 18, 2018 @09:48PM (#17106185)
I hear you.

The book I mentioned (Thinking in Promises) is the introductory-level public book.

https://www.amazon.com/Promise-Theory-Principles-Application... is the heavy-duty scientific stuff.

"In Search of Certainty" (https://www.amazon.com/Search-Certainty-Science-Information-...) is somewhere in-between.

I would say promise theory is its own kind of logic and notation. Thanks for the correction @dozzie.