README and more

TL;DR -- README! Such a minor thing. It's age old. We don't seem to know where it started. But, it relates to the world of code. It's nice that GitHub, old ways being new with the internet and worldwideweb. In any case, now AI has put its wannabe head into code from various positions. We have payed sporadic attention and thought that it deserves a more regular focus. 

--

We have mentioned GitHub (Wikipedia overview) several times since around the 2020 timeframe. Our latest post was motivated by an email feed from the GitHub team that related to an article on those who maintain code. That role was always seen as less important than the "cowboy" roles of the developer. 

Stopping a minute. GittHub is an on-line example of what can be termed code management. This type of facility/utility evolved over the years until it's a fairly robust addition to good business practices. Some have used CMS for this type of work. However, we have had lots of posts about Content Mangement and will continue. AI modes will require extra efforts at curating. So, stay tuned.  

Now, back to the "cowboy" (apologies to the real type). Guess what? Lots of developers put stuff out and strutted off the stage like the stud. Oh, btw, this is an old guy writing who has seen this stuff for decades. And, after strutting off, the stud left the errant traces of his work for other to clean up after. Much like the mother after her kids. 

Mixed metaphors, I know. But continuing. I'm working with a project that will try to incorporate AI modes (we'll be more specific later) into a new system which is supposed to revolutionize the economy, as a whole. Large piece of pie to bite from. Anyway, I will still blog though I'll be going to other blogs and linking from those back to here. 

Another bit of interest? GitHub and OpenAI have been working for awhile on a Copilot which is supposed to aid in developmenr or general code management. This joint work started in 2021 which was a year before the general release of ChatGPT. BTW, if you are wondering what this is about, see a brief history of GPT. The author writes about research on AI (mainly machine learning). 

Again, back to the subject. Today's mail pointed to this discussion: How are AI coding tools changing the way developers work? This is from the maintainers group referenced above. In reading the text of the discussion, there were some things that stood out. One was this: AI might not write a book, but it can write a good paragraph. 

Before proceeding, though, a couple of words. Yes, one can drive a small nail with a sledge hammer. But, it's a mismatch of need and what's being used to fulfill the need. Too, AI (GenAI, in particular) is hugely chewing up resources. For what? They need large data centers that requires an unwarranted amount of energy. Too, they need water for cooling. And, more. They're noisy. They make the landscape other than desirable. Go look at those that surround the lovely Virginia countryside of Dulles (IAD). 

So, reading the article was interesting. I went to look at their site and saw that this group started to publish in April of 2023. That would have been when the reality of ChatGPT and its kin was sinking in which was a mere five months after the release. As a reminder, OpenAI went viral and got millions of people to sign up for the free ttrial. Too, lots of folks bought in, including companies. 

All of that will eventually be analyzed. I started last year in another context: Knowledge Systems Center, Sperry Univac. As mentioned in the last post, I have been off helping to support a project as it gets off the ground. So, there are pending tasks that will be picked up again. 

Now, the effort at GitHub is called The ReadME Project. Coders have used a README forever, it seems. Software usually had this text file that included some documentation, or information about using the software, and more. So, does Wikipeda say anything about the README? Yes. 

Now back to the GitHub project. Here is a little bit of the notices sent since they started. AI itself has only come into focus the past few of these. 

• 06/26/2024 - AI is here. How is it changing the way developers work?
• 05/23/2024 - Maintainer Month: The joy of open source
• 04/17/2024 - Getting started in a career in platform engineering
• 03/12/2024 - Intelligent uses for AI in coding
• 02/13/2024 - Best practices for open source maintainers
• 01/09/2024 - Creating technical content
• ...
• 08/01/2023 - Getting started with edge computing | The ReadME Project Q&A
• 07/13/2023 - How to make your first open source contribution
• 07/10/2023 - How to handle programming paradigm shifts | The ReadME Project Q&A
• ...
• 06/13/2023 - Non-code contributors: The unsung heroes of open source
• 05/25/2023 - Elevating contributors into maintainership | The ReadME Project Q&A
• 05/09/2023 - Is it still "open source" if you don't accept contributions?

For an old timer, seeing all of this progress is a pleasure. There are several caveats which come from doing this for years including stints in the plush offices dealing with management and its science (if there is such). Evidence of this is becoming apparent to me. People, the key resource, are being driven to distraction and worse being slaves of automation. Oh, I would write more and will. Not just now. 

This year, I saw USDOD mention that people and their intuition ought to be the focus, not the computational twin that is a wannabe, many times over. All of this may seem new. It's not and has been going on for a long while. What's new? We can't hide the realities so much under proprietary cloaks when the evidence are huge monoliths traipsing along our skyline and blocking our rightful views ;>). 

Remarks: Modified: 12/28/2024

12/28/2024 -- See updates in GB, XIV, 1 for 2024 updates. 

Science and AI

TL;DR -- Wherein we look at an old problem which has new twists due to technology and its new ways. Media and news morph information severely.  

--

Now, I did not use AIn't in the title because I must refer to what might be called the real "AI" which would be a tool for all of us, including science. Now, "science" has a lot of meanings. We are being all-inclusive. Many think the "hard" types are the top-dog. That drives the STEM focus. But, there are the social sciences which deal with people issues. There is the medical science. We can have a "holy" science that could be discussed. The range covers the whole of humanity and the lives involved. 

Lately, computer science came along which is still being defined. AIn't, partly, might be attributable to issues there. But, mathematics, itself, needs attention as it swerved to mainly being quantitative in focus. Some of this goes back to computing's growth over the past century and its becoming useful through time so as to be everywhere now, via the cloud. We will discuss, later, the concept of qualitative means required by mathematics. The "pure" aspects of the discipline might be invoked, but we are talking other issues that technology will bring to bear. 

Recently, I discussed AI in the context of quantum mechanics (QM). I'll explain more as we go along, but the gist of the conversation was the difference between an overview versus being in touch with the specifics. The former is the state that anyone not involved with a discipline can attain without additional effort which was not really possible in the past. Now, with the cloud (and Wikipedia), one can read on any subject. Now, of course, AIn't's rise make things murky. What can you believe now? 

If I say, not much, that is a statement that was true in the past. But, now? That "not much" would have to be change to "very little" (can be believed) perhaps even "nothing". Okay? Things are dire. We all have to be exceedingly careful and observant. 

Wait, Wikipedia itself? Well, every page there has a history. We must use that facility. And, all changes are tracked with respect to time, editor, and difference in content. This is so back to the beginning of the page. Other sites offer similar means for determining status and history. In general, going forward, we need markers and more (truth engineering will be the topic for this discussion). 

---

So to the theme of the post. The friend showed me [a print of] an article that had appeared in the latest The Economist. Here is another article that quoted The Economist: A New Way To Predict Ship-Killing Rogue Waves. Within this feed, there is a link to the article (requires payment). The article had been marked at the points where the author of The Economist article raved on about AI and the way that this example solved problems beyond the imagination of humans (my paraphrase). Not as a retort, but in the spirit of debate, I marked [the article] where there were words about "mathematical routines" and the use of other techniques to check results of the AI (neural network) approach. Another approach used was of the evolutionary programming type which we have seen used in production. 

Of course, at the end of The Economist's article, there were the words "could" and "should" which are handwaving. The article did not go as far as some modern one have done where it exults of some accomplishment and its promise. Then, at the end, the article (probably forced by the editor) puts in words about this and that and the other thing (my words and emphasis) all being required as, essentially, the thing does not work as the glowing report might have suggested. 

---

In my usual manner, I went to look at the situation. 

Disclosure: The following recognizes the excellent work in this example. The intent is merely to demonstrate what is always a problem: transforming information into other states, faithfully. News and media face this all of the time; modern times seem to be allowing more laxity with its consequences. 

An irony: Perhaps, AI (in a real sense which we have not seen yet) could help hone messages to be more truthful in the transforms. Let's table that, for now. 

The researcher gave a talk at the National Academy of Sciences about legitimate research. And, as is becoming more imperative, he placed his data and the code on GitHub. Also, thanks to the cloud (it has its good points), we can find records for him on Google Scholar, GitHub (repository for code and more where he put his experimental code), and more. 

But, someone at The Economist reported. Or, they read some abstract. 

We, on the other hand, can look at links with supporting information. 

1. The data issues. One commenter touted that there are 300 years of data from an old science. As in all cases, the new approach is starting from the "state of the art" developed by humans and their methods. 

https://static-curis.ku.dk/portal/files/271761876/s41598_021_89359_1.pdf  

2. This is the paper which was quoted by The Economist and others. It can be found at ARXIV. And, the paper only mentions AI cursorily.   

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2311.12579.pdf  

Abstracts are everywhere, as we find nowadays: NIH; Google Scholar; ... 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37983488/

https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&user=8jzVkXEAAAAJ&citation_for_view=8jzVkXEAAAAJ:3fE2CSJIrl8C

3. The code for the experiments that are reported in the paper and the related data are available at GitHub. This type of disclosure is becoming an imperative for several reasons which we will discuss. Now, one bit of irony is that GitHub has piloted the "pilot" mode which has been going on for awhile where people use xNN/LLM to work code. We will look at that process in a later post. 

https://github.com/dionhaefner/rogue-wave-discovery

----

Now, this is an example of science using computing and doing experiments related to analyzing data. It is only one example of lots of work being done that is legit. Those efforts need to be brought to attention and recognized. Lots of shuffling up goes on, much under the guise of feeds. 

But, with the AIn't and its activities coming into play, how do we know legit from not? That is one of the themes that will be of importance in the future with regard to technology in general. One might say that this type of work is what the internet was created for. 

Now, using "collegial" for the former times and their ways, even then there was need for "peer" review and other scrutiny. But, the spirit of the times stressed truthful work and efforts at promoting proper communcation. 

Background processes (there are many others beyond AIn't) always were problematic. The lesson from the mobile phones and their apps brought that to bear. 

Remarks: Modified: 12/22/2023

11/30/2023 -- Minor corrections. 

12/22/2023 -- THE FUTURE OF AI IN SCIENCE AND MEDICINE, talk at Gairdner Foundation, Oct 25, 2023. 

Paper Trails

TL;DR -- The Economist reviewed a book that reported on research using Post Offices as a proxy for studying population and movement. The demo and its code for the project is at GitHub with Harvard providing the data repository. This is an example of a growing trend related to reproducibility through time and across region. We look at maps that show the early start and the frontier century. We will revisit the theme as we dive further into research which will also look at nautical world as well as influences other than New England. 

--

We have followed New England's influence starting with the nautical experiences and then getting into the frontier times in the west. St. Louis will be a center point for the earlier part of the westward movement since it was involved in carving up (see Bent post on surveyor father and his trapper son) the huge pieces that were obtained via the Louisiana Purchase and later acquisitions. But, there was movement inward from the left coast, too, as well as from the south (giving us Texas, the great State) and its spheres. 

So, our research focus will include, then, four centers with Salem in the east (yes, we see Winthrop as a later arrival), St. Louis in the center, San Francisco out on the left coast, and somewhere in TX as a southern point. Perhaps, San Antonio. Too, rather than the esteemed heights of the historian (academic) as the focus, we are following families, especially in regard to the middle not being flyover country. 

The below is motivated by an article in The Economist (How the West was won). So, there is an aura (per usual, Brits, what else?) of judgment that seemed to waft from what the verbiage expressed. Okay, we like the mag, for depth of content and humor. Also, they are talking of a book, same title as the post. Here are some links related to the book and author. 

• Cameron Blevins - teaches United States history and digital humanities. 
  
• About that last, he offers details about his research via GitHub. The data is available from Harvard's Dataverse. 
• His book, Paper Trails, uses Post Office locations as a proxy for the movement. Notice the graphic and its flow through time (from early on to 2000). 
• By State, First Post Offices (USPS.com). 

Now, with respect to GitHub, we have referenced this several times as it pertains to the work of Gardner Research and to the notions of the digital realm (for which we propose truth engineering as a necessity). Our portal (https://TGSOC.org) is a start on the long trek required. Expect the theme to continue. 

Before going further, we want to remind everyone of the Age of Colonialism. The U.S. did not run around the world competing with Europe. Rather, we had our own internal dynamics. The look at the carving of part of the hemisphere will cover that. The nautical? Ah, business on and enabled by the sea. Boston got its Brahmins. The left coast and Texas? We'll punt that to later posts. 

We did snap of Professor Blevin's graphic at dates that are pertinent to our work. We are diving, now, into the situation at the beginning of the wild west, and a little before as we recognize New France and New Spain. We want to go to about the 1850s where the middle was being used as a cultural battleground long before the Civil War. But, the graphic also includes the beginning (1792) and a couple of snaps from the 20th century. 

This page gives details about the analysis using Post Offices. The image below was created from snaps from that page. Note: the application is hosted at GitHub. 

This is only an introductory look. At the top is 1792 when the new country was getting its legs. There is a little dot out west marked by a red arrow (New Orleans? Too early; looks more like TX and too early; so stray dot?). The next row is our current interest which involves the early surveying times (1805) and the time of regular traffic via the trails (1855). The next row is our Frontier Century snap (1811-1921). Why 1811-1921? The snap was after a stop. The years are close enough for what we are doing now. After all, 1811 is one year before 1812's turmoil. 1921 is after both WWI and the Spanish Flu. Lots happened to families between that time. 

We will get more fine-grained later. Lots to discuss there. In the last row is 1990 which is interesting when compared to the 1921 snap. As one watches the graphic, dark regions become light as POs close for any number of reasons. The thing is that the highways become visible. 

Aside, Jedediah Strong Smith gets little respect for mapping out the CA Interstates ;>). He got us aware of the long reach of New England. But, too, he was around a whole lot of other folk that we have looked at and will continue to study. 

Remarks: Modified: 06/17/2021

06/17/2021 -- Added the TL;DR. 

Maintainers

TL;DR -- GitHub has May as Maintainers Month where Open Source folks get together and compare notes as well as party. We say, maintainers are of all sorts, including those working what might be called legacy stuff. 

-- 

Maintainers? Who are they? What have they to do with TGS, Inc. and Gardner theme? 

Well, we are taking a technology focus. The NEHGS this month is touting how AI will change Genealogy. We say, wait a minute, folks. This stuff would work better if people knew what was going on under the covers. Right now, we have an uncertain situation due to choices by those pushing out this stuff. 

Take GenAI, please. The EU (yes, our European cousins) as telling OpenAI that their ChatGPT-4 is not suitable for real stuff. Myself? I looked at the latest verison and failed it with two questions. I wrote of it somewhere (will try to find this). Actually, folks, The Atlantic had it right in 2022 when the first release came about: toy not tool. 

Okay, the theme? We have had many post on technology. Some mentioned GitHub. So, that site is an example of handling code. What is involved with that? Well, code is developed. We can go into this but pass over it for now. When code is ready for use, it's executable plus there are copies of it in library form. That's the bailiwick of the likes of GitHub. One might say code management.

And, GitHub has May as Maintainer Month. In their version, the focus is on Open Source. That has become the norm where people keep a system/program going by offering their services, for free. Many of these people have jobs doing the same thing. John spent his career in code in a large variety of situations. "code maintenance" is important; its history is that the newbies get the task. 

But, as systems mature, more and more talent/experience is needed in order to keep it running and up to date. On the other hand, development of new stuff may be exciting. For a while, as no major system ever gets easier as it comes into being. Now, maintainign something that you did may be more fun. But, it's not easier, necessarily. 

So, we're nodding to code maintainers of all sorts. It'll be a necessary job now and into the future. Right now, "legacy" types are in serious needs of maintenance. 

Wait, GenAI as removing the need for people? Think again. Those doing that sort of thing, managers wanting something for nothing, will pay the price. Too, their customers will be impacted. It's too bad that there is a lack of maturity. But, we have to agree on how these things ought to be run. 

You know, GenAI is trained on code that has not been curated. Hence, errors are incorporated from the beginning. Let''s talk a realistic approach. Done right, it would go along the line of code "snippets" that John started doing long ago. As well, done right, we could track the history of major software and problems involved with such. That is, GenAI is a tool with insights that are artificial. It does not have insight which is the key deal. 

Remarks: Modified: 05/29/2024

05/29/2024 --

Presence and such

The internet has changed things tremendously, as we see with this last holiday season where bricks and mortar continued to suffer at the hands of the ease (and such) of the virtual shopping experience. Then, we see how the internet has adapted to the facility of mobility. The Economist, recently, looked at how the internet's offerings have changed how we get news; and, there is a wide gap twixt what the older folk do to, and how those younger, get their information.

Many societies are in the midst of trying to figure out how to obtain a balance in regard to presenting their information or to finding what they need, in a manner that allows generational peace and harmony. We are considering our options and will venture along a few paths this year. First, though, let's review what we have now.

• Main site - This is our main collective of information, having started in 2010. It has gone through several iterations that parallel the changes in the general mode. Except, we are hosted on a server rather than using the cloud. There is a lot to discuss about the requirements for this type of presentation. 
• Context blog - This started early, jointly with the main site. It serves several purposes including providing a timeline. One huge aspect of computing derives from its ability to handle time and coordinate between disparate groups with ease. Somewhat, one might add (next bullet), more problematic than we would like to think about. Currently hosted via Google, we are considering bringing this under the umbrella of our server (however it may be configured in the future).  
• Technology blog - The internet is a mess. We have tried to present the discussions over the period at each major decision point. This blog helped. Too, it's based upon one of the most-used internet resources, however we've kept a minimal presence for several reasons which the blog itself will be used to discuss. Though using WordPress, it's based on our own server (as an aside, shared server - and, somewhat virtual).   
• Portal (to truth) - As mentioned in this blog post (Gardner's Gate), the internet has accumulated lots and lots of stuff about 'all things Gardner' for quite a while. Before the www, we have the various communication schemes going on that allowed people to have access and to do things.  
• Facebook - We are using this, mostly, for notices. Many times, links to blog posts are pushed up. As well, lots of groups have established themselves on FB. So, we can do a lot more and do it better. Time and energy are two major constraints. Actually, the most prevalent ones. 
• WikiTree - The Thomas Gardner page is being edited with our help. We have established Thomas and Margaret as husband and wife and parents. We used Dr. Frank to have threads from then to now. Lots have added their ancestors' information, however there are many holes. We need to do, at least, five generations. 
• PInterest - We just added another pin. Mostly, this was experimental. There are other options. So, the discussion will be ongoing. 

Need to add in GitHub. One thing that the Thomas Gardner Society, Inc. will not do is buy into some service without consideration of pros and cons. Too, these will be documented. This might cause a bit of delay, but the future, to be secure, demands this. And, we are trying to provide interesting technical work for those who might be available or who want to learn about the ins and outs. GitHub is one of the facilities where developers hang out. Whatever processes we come up with for work management by a group will use GitHub, or something comparable.

Future alternatives would include other types of media than what we have addressed so far. However, let's look at a picture. In our post on Houses being Homes, we suggested that one could use Salem for some very good experiments. Given that many pieces of property were in the same family for year, we could follow that thread. Also, we could do modeling (next) of sorts that would provide more information that one can get now. It turns out that the Gardner family has lots of examples. We can branch to other areas, such as Nantucket, Maine, and even west.

Let's take Salem, though. We already mentioned with regard to Thomas' grave. It is missing. We could model with with the facilities of virtual-reality tools. At the same time, augmentation would allow us to present historical information in interesting ways.

All of this would take work. However, the cloud and other computing facilities are there. Some of the technology being developed for gaming would be apropos. Some of this has been on the table for discussion for some time. Of late, discussions about the Downing-Gardner-Bradstreet house bring the topic to fore. I am referring to Ann's house. It was featured in the Streets of Salem blog: First-Period Fantasy. This would make a very interesting case for a historical deep dive. So too would the 1st house put at Cape Ann by Thomas' crew.

BTW, part of the technical focus would be to get the younger set involved. With respect to learning, we have an endless set of things to do. Some are harder than others. But, there is nothing that would prevent anyone with the motivation to contribute their effort.

Remarks: Modified: 07/31/2020

07/31/2020 -- We will start to address issues of the future in the next issue of Gardner's Beacon (Vol. X, No. 1).

New infrastructure

TL;DR -- A look at what we need to do and the various contexts involved including our content which covers several domains and our need for configuration management. The web's evolution will be on the table in terms of choices, both good and bad, by the developers of the mess. Updated graphic and comment about WordPress are later edits. This was a pre-COVID post. 

---

We have all heard this over the past couple of decades. Well, we can finally say that things are at a crux, especially with the emergence of DL's facilities. They were always there; of late, people learned how to exploit.

Create or discover? Well, like the chicken and egg, which is first? I'm of both minds where 'discover' is given respect. So, Poisson's name is on stuff. He created this. Or, was he describing what he saw and we labelled it with his name as if the underlying ability came about with observation?

With the internet, we get to reason on these things, again, albeit with some practical focus as the intent is to use the thing properly, smartly, and to the best of our ability. I've put out a few posts about this. In July, it was Techie stuff. There were things before, say the technology blog. This started at WordPress[dot]com but, recently, moved to be under our 'portal to truth' (lots to discuss there). At that site, we have continued our blogging about decisions.

I have been working alone, for the most part, just following my intuition. 'Minimal' was one goal. Last fall, I mentioned some Google discussions that were right on (in this old guy's mind) and comforting, actually. Though, as an aside, they own this blog space. We're looking to pull it, too, under our portal.

In the meantime, AI is going bonkers. It's obvious, to me, that the black box can be tamed. It'll take us getting back to logic. What the hey? Minsky of MIT went to his grave arguing that the aNN (no matter the variations, thereof) as not the way. Not that I agree with him entirely, but he was not off the mark. Everywhere, we see AI this and AI that. Makes one wonder if some parts of the populace have lost their marbles.

As an aside, our portal thoughts make use of the fact that Thomas Gardner is almost a tabula rasa given that we know only a little but have the huge set of progeny to ponder. That means, in other words, the 'every man' is the theme or meme. We'll get back to that.

This blog has been going for 10 years. We started the WordPress one due to the details being handled with regard to choices. Of course, as we studied, we had to see where the crowd was going (below). And (yes, this is real), every time, we looked at what led to the current state (our's and the world of computing's) and tsk'd (want to know why? paying attention to the messes?). Sheesh. Do we ever get anything right? For anything of benefit, there are a slew of side-effects, costs (what have you) that are negatively imposing. This is without fail.

AI came on the scene, again, the past few years. Gaga time. This time, though, the older minds were saying, wait, let's talk: ACM, IEEE, etc. So, that's something else to discuss.

But, with regard to what the TGS needs, we have to develop. I have run across roll-your-own schemes. Guess what? The monied crowd does this to remove dependencies upon others. I'm stressing it due to issues of truth engineering. In any case, code will be to the fore. What? Yes, too many are being led down paths to perdition, it seems. We have been right so far in that assessment. I don't see glowing examples, yet.

As an aside, with regard to the below, we were doing Microsoft in the (mis-guided?) notion of going with ASPX and its way of the world. We'll mention this again.

But, the tools are there for us to do things better. Metrics, in other words, used wisely can be quite helpful. The benefits that have accrued properly to technology are examples. Lots of them. So, getting back to the theme of the post, here is an example.

This image comes from the source for a post that is worth reading: How WordPress Changed the Internet - 17 Facts about WordPress. I like it if only it shows that the old guy isn't off the wall. 

Aside: The source? W³Tech and their Web usage surveys where they are looking at content management. Look at the count! Babel building.  

In the 2012 time frame, as we were being kicked off of Microsoft's site, I looked at all three of these. In fact, I prototype'd a TGS site. At the time, I was up to my ears in new information having started to really get into the history and genealogy of the Cape Ann crew. So, there wasn't time to play with configuration when 'content' was the key thing. Notice the comparative growth of these three.

Aside, content and configuration? These differ (the media is not the message).

I looked at WordPress, again, in 2014. Those prototypes had been done under our own server. In the new mode, I went and built under WordPress' site (in the beginning, there were no ads; they came later; hence, we're moving). But, in 2012, I fell back to HTML, tables, icons, and mouse handling. It worked. On the 2014 go around, I brought in CSS and some javascript. The latter was, finally, made more central as it builds the page.

Now, what was one problem in 2012? The database. Too much of it (let's discuss). We can go into this, but the TGS site uses Linux and files. Guess what? Recently, after reading some UBerkeley stuff on AI, I went to GitHub, finally. Ah, the choices, related to text or graphics, etc., were all there for daily discussion while people were, at the same time, doing useful stuff within their chosen framework.

Talk diversity. This is one type that we need and can handle. Though, there are always forces pushing for homogeneity. Mathematicians love this.

BTW, on the latest look at WordPress, as I was bringing it into our portal, I looked at the 'biz' aspects of its use. Nickel and dime'ing was my reaction; like the menu that is ala carte. Nice, but, I want to see what's under the cover (or hood or ... - we used to say). Too, I want more than mere parametric influences. BTW, that is one issue with DL and AI, right now.

Yes, again, anyone interested in machine learning in the context of TGS, pipe up, please.

Closing this out, we have lots of things pending. See this blog that will move (https://jmswtlk.github.io/GitHub-ing/) which will cover the deeper technical issues as we go along. So, indeed, we're talking infrastructure in a new sense, actually senses.

Oh yes, ASPX. Recently, I have been helping in a situation where this is the framework. Not as a developer, but rather as a late tester of a new process. Interesting. Some things I liked, others not. How to get the proper balance will always be a key thing? And, whose balance?

Aside, again. The earlier post pointed to a project management scheme that has gotten a lot of attention. It reminds me of the old Apple package that was card-based. That is, one had cards that linked in a manner that was fairly powerful (we're talking 80s, folks). I see it referenced from time to time. Lift the covers, and you'll find old routines still supporting the computing world. Trouble is, though, that it's in the GUI world. Most stuff is. Developers? Many stay away from that. Actually, WikiTree is balanced and a joy to use. GitHub is more textual with add-ons for the GUI'ness.

How ought we to go? Decisions will be made. None will be in concrete.

When looking at Drupal and Joomla, I also looked at Concrete 5. It's still around. The Army picked it. Okay. How does one decide in all of this? Want to know. Computational sustainability. That'll be a future topic.

Aside: Paying attention? Old guy off the wall? Well, no, here is a current discussion of Concrete CMS versus Wordpress. Of course, it is from Concrete CMS's viewpoint. You see, 'new infrastructure' points to changes that will be permanent. Users want more control. Developers want tools. Content creators and managers want ease of applying power. Finally, John can say, about time. Maturity?  

Remarks: Modified: 10/07/2022

10/07/2022 -- Updated graphic on WordPress which had come from a survey. Put in pointers to survey. This week, decided to use WordPress to prototype our configuration. 

GitHub as an example

TL;DR -- We have come a long way since 2009. So, too, has the world. And, change? Many things have happened over the past two decades. But, just the past decade and its new ways need a lot of attention. We'll be pursuing discussion of all of this under the guise of technology, especially computing. In this post, we look at some dealings of Microsoft. 

 

--

We have mentioned our technology focus from time to time and what motivated our thinking. On the first topic, we have had several posts this year. Here is a sampling: Year to date, 2023; Knowability; Technology thoughts. For the second focus, we have had seveal posts about the Gairdner Group of Canada. 

Our topics of a technical level would relate to computing and its growing basis operationally plus the impacts that we see and will see. But, there is a lot involved, hence we will do a series of posts relating to different aspects of technology via computing. 

Code is (has been) how we govern what computers do. Much code is outside of our influence. In cases where we can actually influence things, the scope is limited. And, the approach is not trivial nor to be taken lightly. Of late, we see emphasis on generating code via what is known as AI. 

As one would expect, code needs management. Per common themes, libraries have been defined for such a purpose. Libraries functions included storing code, keeping track of changes, and much more. One of the utility functions would be version control. There are other functions and utility programs developed over time to provide access to functions while providing some track record of events relate to code change. 

A popular project was Git which came to fore in 2005. Before then, there were many others which are still around. But, we picked Git due to its lack of earlier involvement. Too, it came to be around the time of Linux and was done by the same programmer. 

Then, that 2005 timeframe was when the US GSO noted that government agencies could use the cloud. Of late, there are several of these services offered. Companies, and people, ponder the benefit and negative effects of taking that turn. The TGS, Inc. server is a shared host, though we use other means that are cloud-based. We have been researching architecture options from the beginning. For us, the concern was expressed as the balancing of content versus configuration. 

We might be said to have gone full circle. Our intitial thrust was on Microsoft's Office Live (need to check the name - we started in the 2009 timeframe). But, we used blogger, too, which was picked up by Google. Then, we have ties to other facilities. Since our focus at the time that Microsoft went to Office 365 was historical and genealogical research which was new to us. Too, we were working on minimal budget by choice. 

We self-funded, and John has worked pro-bono on this and other projects since the beginning. That gave us freedom to study when and where we thought there was something of interest. Of course, we followed the machine learning work, as our interest is truth engineering. John will explain the particulars. That work was done independently. Except, all along, the 400 years of generational change in the U.S. very much has analogs in what we see (or have seen) with computation. That is a topic needing some discussion. 

Computing, as we saw it evolve over the past 20 years, has gone astray. Ignoring that, for now, we are now back to Microsoft several ways which we will explain, in time. Today, we point to a Microsoft project the results of which are being documented at GitHub. That is "Git" in the cloud. In the past, coordinating the code work of projects was fairly hairy. It still is. However, the cloud allows common access to people in disparate regions working at different times of the day. Too, the control mode can be better documented and managed. 

So first, this bullet points to Microsoft's project's repository collection. They have been doing this for several years now. 

• Open source projects and samples from Microsoft 

As an aside, GitHub works with OpenAI (publisher of ChatGPT) to support a "Copilot" project in which people use the xNN/LLM approach to help them with coding tasks. We are skirting that discussion, for now; be assured, we will get back to that. Then, Microsoft has supported OpenAI and has tied its Bing to some level of the ChatGPT system.

Now, back to Microsoft, a team related to the company has been using the new ways in pursuit of market analysis which goes with the new modes of algorithmis trading. Besides value that might relate to successful trading, however that might be defined, we have to look at concerns of many of natures, many of which would have been purely academic had these new ways not created a means to observe. And, so whole new approaches to busyness and its modes are now reachable, albeit not as easily as the reports may get one to consider. 

• Qlib is an AI-oriented quantitative investment platform that aims to realize the potential, empower research, and create value using AI technologies in quantitative investment, from exploring ideas to implementing productions. 

Code generation is found everywhere now. In terms of the interfaces, we like Bard though it suffers from the same problems as do the others. A huge discussion going forward will be how to balance the dynamics of the new way which we have seen generates many reactions from maniac dreaming to angst of machine dominanc. 

Our intent is not to lessen the seriousness of the different view nor to argue that we do not know enough to make good decisions. One factor being overlooked is that the underpinnings of the operational truths deal, for the part, with applied mathematics having found a home on the computer, partly has this happened because of design changes. The motives for progress largely was gaming and trying to enhance the illusory experience. 

Well, we got that now many fold. 

Remarks: Modified: 10/30/2023

10/30/2023 -- 

Techie stuff

It's time to look at techie stuff, again. At our portal to truth, we have a page that summarizes our experiences since 2010 with an associated blog. Basically, we stepped from Microsoft (asp) to Linux while trying to maintain our research focus (2012 timeframe, 2013 update). This was the motivation behind our technology blog. From that early time to now, we have, mostly, rolled our own simple approach while surveying the industry.

And, do things ever change. This note is a stop and relook affair. We recently started to look more closely at Trello.com for several purposes. It has interesting features and a few wonderful applications done by clever folk.

So, for now, a list of comparison of applications of this type.

• Trello vs Smartsheet
• Trello vs Evernote vs Wrike
• Trello vs Asana vs JIRA Software vs Teamwork Projects

That's quite a bunch and only touches upon a small percentage of the class. And, in considering the other types of applications that can be used by a small business, we're talking a veritable jungle. Except, Trello is extensible through providing an API so one can still 'roll their own' which is not undesirable.

One option is to go with a more cohesive package as was being looked at earlier (Joomla, et al). Or, there is Wordpress which is the basis for our technology blog. It allows one to plug-in from many directions and build a huge package.

The quandary remains? What to do? No complaint. This is fun, as we can still keep working within our little domain covering 400 years of history while we tangle with a mere 15 years of computing.

Note: There will be a post in each of the blogs (TGS and technical) and entries at our site (What's new, technology and practice) that will pull this work together so that we can move ahead yet look at the pros and cons of choices being made.

Guess what? No regrets of the decisions taken so far.

Note: Choice of Trello, as a possible means, comes from talking to a grand-nephew (Steven Huggard - Full-stack developer) about modern methods and software. On looking at it further, the company is out of New South Wales. So, what's not to like? List of products from Atlassian. ... However, Atlassian picked up Trello (a whiteboard) from Glitch (formerly Fog Creek). And, Glitch has it own set of products, such as Stack Overflow.

Note: We would move the technical team from FB to a real project-oriented approach. Other suggestions would be okay. Email me at jmswtlk@tgsoc.org.

Remarks: Modified: 11/03/2020

08/09/2019 -- Started a project on GitHub which will lead toward coordinating several projects. See our PortalToTruth.

11/03/2020 -- We are about ready to commence work on further improvements that carry a message regarding the tradeoffs that we ought to face but mostly ignore. Some see fiddling as a right. Fine. But, there is always more work to be done than bodies (minds) to do it. Per usual, we'll be blogging on things encountered, especially issues. In regard to the content of this post, we find GitHub to be remarkably well suited as is evidenced by its popularity. On software, we have seen plenty great use of, and supporting arguments for, html/css/js. But, Julia has come along. Saw an application in Physics that tipped the balance a little in its favor. 

The future

The 2020 festivities have been muted all around. Everywhere one looks, there is something about COVID-19 and its impact. We lost our spring this year of which this is the last day.

Here is a collection of COVID-19 articles from the IEEE Spectrum (COVID-19 -- Your IEEE Resources). I wanted to point to another article dealing with Control Theory which is apropos to our work, several ways. However, that is a discussion for another time as we, basically, are stumbling toward the future as a whole. These times show that looking forward is hard, virtually impossible, except we seem to forget that (the sun rises in the east in the morning). No one expert, or set of experts, can tell us how this will unfold.

So, we look backward. Which is what the TGS, Inc. has been touting since its beginning. One post of note would be this one: A new science. As well, we need to dampen anything vanity. Of late, we have been using WikiTree for our work due to its open nature. Many ways to work are heavily controlled which can limit. We need to work a balance.

Notice that in the above article from the IEEE Spectrum they mention GitHub, in particular, a model. We ventured into GitHub and its technology (see link at our portal - TGSoc.org) last year and will be using it more (or some equivalent, perhaps, at some point). It's a way to handle management of content, usually thought of as being technical in nature. That does not have to be, as any type of content can be managed.

If you look, you will see that lots and lots of ways to do things have been offered. Some type of acceleration took place after the mobile approaches got enabled. We did our initial look a few years ago and will pivot that way more due to the lessons learned the past few months. That is, apps are in the future, but we will be looking at issues of sustainability through time. There has been enough done the past decade and one-half to make decisions that can lead the way into the future.

We are still looking forward to 2023/24 (400th) and 2026 (250th) with a perspective of establishing a more solid presence via media (in ways un-thought of, yet). Lots to do.

Remarks: Modified: 06/19/2020

06/19/2020 --

Support for TGS, Inc.

There are several updates pending to our websites that will appear in the next few weeks. We have made some changes to our 'portal to truth' that pertain to future activities. For one, the historical roll has been extended. There is a lot more to add. Right now, it refreshes each time the page is loaded. Sources are marked. This scroll with become interactive and link to supporting resources. Along with this scroll, we have an index by images that point to our work and thoughts, by time.

TGS, Inc. Biz

As well, we changed the menu so that we can separate out biz and tech. Right now biz provides buttons for donations either by PayPal or via mail. Plus there is a form for ordering publications by mail. Next up will be ordering of publications via PayPal. Following that, there are other changes planned. Tech points to our technology blog (theme of content versus configuration).

The main site will be where we old the majority of our documents and will be re-organized. It more or less has the same look as back in 2010 when we started. Both sites will become more interactive as we proceed.

• Donate -- Contributions of funds to the Thomas Gardner Society, Inc. can be handled via menu or by mail. Helping us with articles or with technical work would be appreciated, too (see Note, below). 
• Meeting -- We are planning a 2020 meeting in the Boston area for next year. Right now, it looks to be in the summer or fall. More details will be forthcoming later. 

As an aside, one direction is toward a TGS app, however, all technical steps will be accompanied by discussion of alternatives and reasons for our approach. In the meantime, we will be more mobile friendly with the intent of establishing a good interface for presentation.

Note: Technically, we picked Linux for its suitableness for our requirements while allowing freedom as we saw with the Unix environment. That is, too, we are cognizant of the GUI/text issues and lean toward a more 'Open mode.' Several times, we have noted that we are looking for hands-on help with our technical efforts. Even novices can help and learn. One resource for coordination will be GitHub. There are links to extensive discussions related to various themes, such as content versus configuration. These two are conflated, seriously, in many cases. too much. GitHub'ing is my personal view to the matter, using TGS, Inc. work as the model for discussion; we will start a specific area for Society work when required to start an archival method for this work.

Remarks: Modified: 10/28/2019

10/28/2019 --

Wikipedia I

TL;DR -- About the Wikipedia page(s) which need some attention.  

---

One of the first things that we did back in 2010 was start the Wikipedia page for Thomas Gardner (planter). To be exact, this is the first issue of the page on 10 Jan 2010. 

1st page - Thomas Gardner (planter)

It was short and quoted Dr. Frank. As well, we updated pages for Gloucester, Cape Ann and the Dorchester Company to reflect the existence of Thomas Gardner. And, of course, we mentioned John Lowell and Isabella Stewart Gardner. Since then, there have been lots of updates. We have created several supportive pages, such as Great House (Cape Ann). 

We actually started this work in 2009, on ancestry. Later, a DAR Registrar mentioned the problems with that approach, so we started our own approach which needs some attention (having millions of bits of data). But, we'll start with Wikipedia which will be updated this month to be more in agreement with the Wikipedia requirements. For instance, some of our work was new though the web was full of stuff. Lots of the resources did not meet standards, even Dr. Frank's book. So, we will shift to using Anderson's look at the Great Migration, with updates. 

For our work here, we decided to use WikiTree since it uses the Wiki paradigm. Note some of the benefits of that in the image. We have been slowly editing the pages for Thomas and Margaret on WikiTree, after establishing our credentials via work at that site. We will be going into more detail this year.  

About Wikipedia, from the beginning, it stood out on the web. There is a lot that could be discussed, but, for most subjects, Wikipedia offered a perfect summary overview, many times written by experts. It's the first choice for our work, here, in most cases, even if we pick it off of the Google offerings after a search. With respect to technology and knowledge (that order, by choice), Wikipedia represents a worldview that is essential. Lots to discuss with regard to this.  

Early on, many academics argued against the approach for many reasons. One of these was the open edit which allows 'graffiti' of various natures, but that can be controlled. Too, lots of opinion has been expressed on the site. But, over the past decade, concerted effort with regard to reviews and such has paid off. 

With respect to changes, we will use CA Anderson's work with updates. Some of these have already been suggested on WikiTree to the Great Migration Project team who has demonstrated an approach that is sorely needed given the free-flow of fluff that one finds on ancestry and the like. 

We will be getting back to ancestry, somewhat using it as a means of demonstration to support the work that will be the focus of our portal (TGSoc.org). 2021 will have a heavy technical focus. As we move along, some requirements will become more in amenable to discussions about tasks. Right now, we are thinking of GitHub as a means for providing a project overview. There are other options. 

Those are configuration issues. Content will continue to grow in size and scope. For instance, one example of many deals with the descendants which has common interest. On WikiTree, all of the children have been represented. Some more sparsely than other. But, that work has to be done by Thomas Gardner descendant who care about the quality of the data. As we mentioned before, one tactic will be to reflect across DAR's view. To the rebellion, we're talking 250 years. Then, we have 150 years to cover before that. 

Now, there has been work done for over two centuries on these subjects. We want to have a bibliographic that is as inclusive as we can make it. We already started that. For instance, thank Rev. Hubbard for making the first reference to Thomas; had Rev Hubbard's manuscript (from 1680) been lost, we would be really deficit. On the computer, work started way before the internet was let loose by DARPA who is finally realizing some mistakes and thinking of the need for a 100-year outlook. 

Want an example? The B52 which is still flying (designed in the 50s). So, we had pre-web stuff. Then, the web stuff can be seen by its generation. We want to map that out. And, we will pull information that can be supported into a common view where WikiTree is only a part. After all, that graphic mode of ancestry does not make for a proper presentation that will survive across decades. 

Now, with respect to that, we might not see some of this come about, but we sure can set up the framework for continued work. If you look in this blog, you'll see our reference to the dude who spent his career at the Library of Congress and did genealogy on the side. When he died, there was some issue about how to support the continuation of the work and site. Fortunately, the NEHGS picked this up. BTW, we just has a post last month on CA Flagg who was at the LoC in the time of Dr. Frank and who contributed to The Massachusetts Magazine and a lot more. 

Remarks: Modified: 01/19/2021

01/19/2021 -- Followed this look with an update from two weeks later, 31 Jan 2020.

Hugging Face

TL;DR -- Old company, IBM, has entered the AI world with a code-sharing effort. This is an example of recent technology changes. 

 ---

IBM got wise and decided to open up machine learning with a code focus. We have mentioned GitHub a time or two. This post is meant to bring this effort to attention, as we will be paying attention. They have tens of thousands of companies signed up. 

So, let's start with an image an a link. 

IBM's new User Camp
related to the Granite approach

This is for code sharing which we may get into. Basically, our focus is analytic, for now. 

Remarks: Modified: 08/30/2024

08/30/2024 --  

Restructuring

TL;DR -- It's been over a year since the generative modes made their appearance. They look good. But, fail mostly. Some say, these are best for fictional situations. Not fact nor truth. Does not have to be that way. People are the clue. At the same time, technology brought a change to our worldview. We are now going into restruction. It will be multi-pronged and not done overnight. 

--

Last year, in February, I did my first evaluation of ChatGPT. Then, I did several sessions on various topics, including lower-level mathematics. Many of these dealt with the overarching issues that seem to get little attention. So, the generative age started. 

The first use of Bard was in June of last year: Getting technical. There were several reasons for preferring this system from Google. Now, it has morphed into Gemini which I have accessed a couple of times which was enough to get the difference. We will continue this analysis. 

Finally, I put together sufficient thoughts to begin a relook at the history of computing and AI from the perspective of someone in the trenches. The first article of a series was titled: AI, not solely ML. This was #1. So far, there have been #2 and #3. The fourth is in the works. The intent of the series was to set up the framework and the necessary subjects so as to discuss a patent and its use. 

The main factor to be discussed will be knowledge-based engineering.  

But, we have the whole of computing to consider within which is embedded things being artificially simulating. Our portal (TGSoc.org) was to serve as an exhibition for custom made as opposed to hugely automated. We will be looking at that, perhaps with CoPilot of GitHub. In any case, there will not be a total turnover to the artificial of responsibility. Though, we will watch others and comment. 

Of course, the motivation is not merely technical. Last year, we learned of new data (from Sherborne, Dorset) and will begin to incorporate this into the Gardner story plus our website's support Gardner Research. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/29/2024

02/29/2024 --  

AI not solely ML

TL;DR -- AI is more than ML. For one thing, people need to be included. A bucket-of-bits oracle never was the goal for reasonable folks. 

-- 

AI was pirated by the machine learning people. Forget AGI. AI is good enough if we remember that "intelligence" is more than we have seen represented on the planet. 

    Artificial intelligence, not solely machine learning

Too forward thinking? Nope. We will get to discussing "truth engineering" at some point. ML optimizes without caring. 

Engineeing and economics go hand in hand. 

---

Aside: After posting the above article, there was a comment from Tomek which touts being an "AI" company. Will look into this further, but Tomek Venture came up with "whois" as well as several others who have Tomek as a name. With respect to the extension ".ai", Wikipedia is a good source. Have not been paying attention, though I did run into this earlier), ".ai" has been a popular extension, since 2009, for its possible association with "AI" the subject of the above article. Tomek is leveraging on that with an automated interface. Perhaps, will look at it further. Otherwise, doing a survey of this type of activity would be more beneficial as it's going to get more prevalent. GitHub's pilot is an example of enablers. To think, in 2012, I was looking at coding manually. Still will. See Content vs configuration. For now, AI, of all sorts digital, arises from buckets-of-bits whose latest magical behavior with respect to text processing has no intent behind it. We're talking a "stochastic parrot" (in the words of some) and similar. That does not mean that meaning may not formulate from the mix, whether good or bad. But, reasoning as enlightenment liked to tout? Not. On the other hand, knowledge-based approaches do a better approximation, with a good example being knowlege-based engineering (KBE).  

Remarks: Modified: 12/30/2023

12/30/2023 -- Added image. 

Measures of the metrical

The modern world runs on numbers. Madly. This is abated by computing which is numbers to its core. Well, not. Anyone poking into the depth knows that we get to hardware, eventually. And, that involves a lot of stuff. In fact, it's so complicated now that we cannot put our fingers on, get our heads wrapped around, attempt to tame, ... a whole bunch of stuff.

So, we have the need for truth engineering. And, to me, TGS, Inc.'s work will involve that. But, let's not get ahead of ourselves. After all, how might deep issues related to filling in family records and such? Ah, heard of 'deep learning' which has been on the news for a little bit now?

We've not shirked dealing with numbers. This little bit is an example. See Review and news from about this time last year. That post points back to 2015 post. There are others of the same ilk that we'll pull together. Every year, we have done a Summary.

I was just looking at some "who is largest?" work that goes on all day. Ever pick up some of these metrics and look at them? First of all, about all combinations are presents, with purty graphics. I'll not step further down that road, right now. But, one has to wonder how the data is attained. Of course, we know. It's our stuff that is freely available due to early discussions. And, that, folks, leads to open issues, still unresolved. So, this post is apropos.

Anyway, here's a little graphic relating to number of posts per month by year with the first nine months of 2019 included.

This year, I decided to do more posts, even though this is run by Google's method. We are working on other approaches, such as this little technical thing on our own server. But, again, that's ongoing. Also, it's more than technical as we discuss motivation.

So, June of this year had the greatest number of posts since the beginning. What was that? Well, There were several themes going on: the missing grave of Thomas, graves of veterans (of several wars) without any information about the person, and more. On the first, we found several paintings of the area of Gardner bridge. More stuff to do there. For one grave, we searched out the person's lineage plus filled in the family information. With that, we got findagrave updated. Also, we got ourselves involved in looking at two Thomas Gardners in the 1623/24 timeframe. Father and son? Lots to consider.

We finally looked at Chronicles of Old Salem and found it quite interesting to our newbie selves. In fact, from that, items have been added to the timeline text at the portal to truth. We have slowly been working on renovations. I have posted some information on GitHub (and will be adding more). Be aware, that we're considering important issues in a manner that does not assume much. As in, yeap, I  mainly work via a laptop. I'll get a smart phone when we get to where we're supporting TGS, Inc. via some of the 'problematic' social media. Oh yes, don't believe me when I say that we've created a mess, in general? Who else but old Thomas Gardner to use as a moral example?

Oh yes, Sidney. He wrote his thoughts on his decade plus efforts in Salem where he found little assistance. Dr. Frank helped. Too, Dr. Frank's sister, Lucie, published a continuation of Sidney's work in The Massachusetts Magazine. Sidney quit his Essex Antiquarian work and went and wrote the History of Salem. His work is the main source for information about the witch mania the yearly celebration of that is coming up.

Oh yes, my posts are longer than one normally finds. Example: The Gardiner that was. My research has found some conflicting stories. How to untangle this knot? It'll happen; we're just collecting data, at this point. Also, I go back and edit posts to add more information (or to make modifications). As well, I add in comments (timestamped). Take Dr. Frank's post. It started in February of 2011. There is also a category of Dr. Frank that pulls related posts together into one view. He was a busy guy and did a whole lot of work. Lots more stuff to discuss. Right now, I am looking at the family history of his two wives.

There are a slew of posts that point to specific articles in The Massachusetts Magazine. We really need an index. This was tried for a couple of Volumes by Dr. Frank. But, that's a lot of work. Examples: NEHGR 2016, NEHGR 2017. That took a bit of work.

As far as that goes, we need an index for Gardner's Beacon.

Remarks: Modified: 11/26/2019

11/26/2019 -- Put in a "Metrical" page with an updated graphic (count for November 2019 is as of end of day, today). Note that the above graphic has 2018 and 2019 out of order as column headers.

Rootstech

TL;DR -- We will pay attention to technology in the small and in the large, especially that related to advanced software. 

---

We love Family Search and have used it since we started this work which was over a decade ago. At that time, some of the interfaces for genealogical packages were still fairly kludgy, so we did our own thing with respect to collecting and storing data. Now that we have more curating work to do, some decisions need to be made. A basic issue? 

There is one choice that people make. They can either go whole hog into someone's care by using a heavily GUI'd system. Or, they can take a more independent approach, as we did. There is a third way which balances the two. Many packages, in their latest manifestation, seem to offer better support. But, we like what WikiTree represents a solution to form and interface. The data is easily accessible, however one also has access to the mark-up level. Granted, this is not code, but it gives one the feel. On the other hand, access to support app extensions will be important, too. 

This year, for the first time, we paid attention to Rootstech which offers the framework with which to look at some of these issues in terms of genealogy work. We will browse this information later; too, we will pay more attention, especially to discussions about the future. 

Another note about the future? How AI will play in all of this? What is called the 'deep fake' approach now can generate photos of people who never existed. Too, it can create videos of characters who are not real doing things that seem natural. Some of the current results are easily analyzed with respect to its truthfulness. A photo might be obviously fake; the character in a video might stand out as a creation. However, this stuff will get more complicated as we go along. 

We have mentioned this before, but one of our research themes deals with these types of issues. Part of the work will be technical; some of it will be more general relating to the American experiment and its possible contribution to age-old dilemmas that are becoming more troublesome. We have mentioned, several times, that we are building a portal. Many times, we add 'to truth' with this type of work in mind. 

For now, we will start pointers to material that is of importance plus some on-going commentary.  

• TensorFlow - From 2019. We saw this contribution by Google to what is called deep learning earlier. And, we have read the discussions about this as being the new AI. The approach has gotten attention due to its demonstrated effectiveness to the extent of watching. These things used by this approach are mostly black boxes for which lots of effort is being placed with regard to understanding what is going on. However, right now, the particular interest for us is the approach's use of graphics. This is not GUI in focus. No, we are talking the very core of our modes for modeling reality and for basing decisions upon such models.  
  
• GitHub - This is a link to the material related to the TensorFlow article. That is, one of the modern benefits is having project and code management available for team work via the cloud. Nowadays, you see lots of papers offering their data via this method encapsulated with the algorithms used for the data. We are using this facility for our portal work, somewhat. 
• Medium - This is the media that provides access to the TensorFlow article. We place it here as an example of sites that provide support in various ways which are going to be important in the future. 

We have to touched upon some of this, in our work, so far: Content can be configuration. And, we will be doing more. We have the technology blog for specifics which will become more active. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/27/2021

02/27/2021 --  

Technical review

TL;DR -- Since we are taking a focus on technology as a thing deserving of attention, we will have to be regular in posting information. Expect that more regularly in 2024 as we commemorate the arrival of Thomas and Margaret (or not, depending upon our research)

---

We ought to have these on a regular basis and will starting next year. For this post, we'll look at a New Yorker article, briefly. Then, we'll add in a comment about a recent post. After that, we'll show a graphic with regard to one of our web servers. Then, we'll start a list of the web presence plus gather all of the technical posts together under various categories. 

Ambitious task? Yes, we'll start today and finish this up with a week. At the same time, we will consider how to do these and with what frequency. 

---

AIn't and AI. We'll be more specific next year. 

• The Godfather of AI - See the New Yorker, 11/17/2023. This is the main article and dealt with an interview of Hinton. There was a genealogical notion brought up. He is Brit and a descendant of Rev. Boole of the logic and algebra that we all love. After casting about for some direction, he picked neural nets. One early act was popularizing the Boltzmann Machine. As we all know, none of the machines/methods found so far is all-powerful. Subsequent work ended up with the back-prop algorithm. In a sense, this is similar to numeric processing oriented toward resolving a multiple-body issue. Definitely, constraint satisfaction applications need a good look. One interesting tidbit is that the author of this article used Kafka's worlview as the basis for an example. This was written up in an issue of the 1986 Nature periodical. To note, please. On seeing an interaction with ChatGPT, he was astonished so as to talk "level of understanding" and even uttered "alive" in the context. He has seen lower-level reality in that his later work deals with neuromorphic approaches. 
• The Economist as example - See the last post: Science and AI. This was motivated by seeing an article in the 11/25/2023 issue of the paper (not a magazine, they say) in which a reporter hypes some good work dealing with rogue waves. Now, everyone ought to be interested as waves are everywhere and densely sought by thinkers. Yet, in terms of the seas, this is old research with lots of data. Too, people have done an exemplary job in trying to understand the data. So, the researcher used the neural net to look at some pre-processed data where the mathematical elements were emphasized. Okay. Good results. But, a genetic (to be discussed) approach was about as capable. The researcher had a disclosurer at the top of his report. Did not TheEconomist writer not see this? Too, there is discussion about next steps. Our gripe? The use of AI as it encompasses much more than machine learning. Now, the post? Links to the data and the paper and the code itself which is at GitHub. That is how things will be, more or less, as research goes further. 

---

In some cases, we can use the facilities provided by the servers: Google; WordPress; Quora; FB. But, for our server, we use a Linux-based shared server. We think of it as balancing reliance on the cloud. Lots to discuss there. 

Related to: TGSoc.org/papers

What we see are six metrics. The world has gone mad numerically, many ways. So, that, too, will be discussed. But, with respect to the flow of activity, the topic was motivated by OpenAI's little trick last November. They didn't do the world a whole lot of favors; rather, we will see, in less than two years, just how negative the impact might have been. Now, will subsequent activity on their part relieve some of this. 

An adage is apropos: one cannot train out the crap that was trained into a system via machine learning. 

At the "Papers" site, we put out an article in May and then followed in the latter months. 

---

Aside: John retired as a Technical Fellow having worked in advanced computing systems most of his career. As such, he dwelt in the space between applications and the underlying technology, principally with regard to data management (early data science) and computational mathematics (in the space of engineering support). When he says, buckets of bits, it's with experience. Knowledge and intelligence? Those were themes in the advanced crowd all during the evolution of computing as we know it now. Or, actually, as we do not know it. Think black boxes and their mysteries? They were created by us. To quote an author who is aware of our work: demon of our own designs. 

---

Punting down the road, we have this blog. Plus there are two on WordPress. Then, our website is hosted on Web Hosting Hub. We started with Microsoft's Open Office (need to find the specific name) and moved when MS pulled the plug. That choice dropped the support for many small businesses who had tried to leverage that capability for their on-line needs. See this search: Configuration. You see, this is paired with "Content" or absence of it (which is very much the case in lots of web stuff). The timeframe was 2012 which was two years after we started. At our portal (to truth), we detail our research with respect to rolling our own. At the time, we were astonished by the amount of work done by those who have the time with permutations without end being made available. Interesting. 

Permutations? Sure, group theory comes to mind. It'll be in the background as we proceed. One problem with AIn't? There is no AI. We're talking sophisticated mathematics in action. So, let's raise that level to where we can get the general populace on board with the future. After all, leaving these things to wizard's is problematic. Did we not all learn that over the past two decades? 

Remarks: Modified: 11/30/2023

11/30/2023 --