[PD] Help Docs: element vs. item

Mathieu Bouchard matju at artengine.ca
Wed Aug 12 22:07:29 CEST 2009


On Tue, 11 Aug 2009, Hans-Christoph Steiner wrote:
> The idea of that section of the PdDefintions wiki is to collect all bits of 
> text that contribute to the definition of what  is a symbol/float/atom/etc. 
> That's why there are many bits. If there is anything missing please add it.

In the Humanities, you can define abstract words the postmodern way, 
collecting little bits and talking about a word until it acquires a 
meaning. In a computer programme, it doesn't matter what the word means to 
the users or even whether the users think of the thing as being abstract: 
symbols and floats are very concrete things that have very precise 
definitions that don't leave a lot of room for interpretational variation.

So I think we can leave the mosaïc of testimonies aside and just read the 
source, so that we get back to what Pd is instead of what we think it is.

> Well, this defintion comes from the "object boxes" section, not message boxes 
> or messages.  There is no discussion of messages in the section where that is 
> defined.  But that's a minor detail.
> http://crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/Pd_documentation/x2.htm#s1.2

Ah, well, when I read that, it never crossed my mind that I had to look up 
the bibliographical reference to actually understand what's written there. 
That's what I mean by "out of context"... the PdDefinition page is 
unusually dependent on its bibliographical references... doesn't stand on 
its own.

  _ _ __ ___ _____ ________ _____________ _____________________ ...
| Mathieu Bouchard - tél:+1.514.383.3801, Montréal, Québec


More information about the Pd-list mailing list