Re: Literate Programming, Axiom, and Physically Based Rendering

[Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson]

Dear Tim,

On Sat, Apr 1, 2023 at 10:22 AM Tim Daly <axiomcas@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
> I had hoped that Axiom could have been reborn as a literate program.
> The idea was to "make it live beyond the authors". Each algorithm
> would provide an explanation, various literature references, and some
> examples as well as limitations. That way a person with no background
> knowledge in computer algebra could learn and contribute. Such a
> literate program would have set the standard for mathematical software.
>
> Sadly that's not going to happen.

My personal involvement with Axiom is probably limited to buying a
manual ages ago.

I recently learned that the LibTomMath book had been removed from the
source repository on GitHub. [1]

/Nothing lasts forever/.

Like Axiom, LibTomMath was a project aimed at teaching people how to
implement multiprecision arithmetic.

Now, that aspect of it has been removed, apparently since Tom himself
is no longer involved.

Moving forward with Axiom is going to be hard, and will probably have
to require some new people to get involved.  That is best served with
financial or other incentives, but I have no suggestions on how to
achieve that goal.

Selling physical copies of [incomplete] Axiom internals might help,
and there are other options such as Patreon.

Good luck, and please don't give up -- even if you take a year or two
off for other things.

[1] The PDF can still be found in the older releases on the same
GitHub, but no new editions will be made there.


-- 
Johann

 I'm not from the internet, I just work there.