Re:Arithmetic is an underrated world-modeling technology
by samatman on Thursday October 17, 2024 @08:00PM
(#41875060)
I am well aware of Frink, and glad you mentioned it!
Julia has the advantage that you can do things with it that aren't unitful calculations, a classic 80% solution. Frink has the advantage that, well... it's Frink. Really nothing else like it.
Re:Arithmetic is an underrated world-modeling technology
by schiffern on Thursday October 17, 2024 @08:04PM
(#41875090)
Awesome! I admit I'm a bit confused though: Frink doesn't force you to use units (you could ignore them if you wanted, and even skip loading the built-in units on startup), so I'm not sure where the advantage is.
Were you thinking of a specific feature set in Julia that's lacking in Frink? Thanks.
Re:Arithmetic is an underrated world-modeling technology
by samatman on Thursday October 17, 2024 @08:22PM
(#41875185)
What I meant is that Julia is a general purpose programming language, and Frink is a comprehensive and thorough calculation DSL.
You could use Frink for things that aren't its focus, of course. But few would want to.
Yes, it has implicit multiplication! :) It also offers exact rational fractions, transparent bigint conversion, and plus/minus intervals that automatically tracks error bars through all arithmetic operations.
Docs: https://futureboy.us/frinkdocs
Online REPL: https://futureboy.us/fsp/frink.fsp?fromVal=1+furlong+%2F+for...
[Unexpectedly humorous] units data file: https://futureboy.us/frinkdata/units.txt