I made a programming language with M&Ms
mufeedvh.com54 points by tosh 9 hours ago
54 points by tosh 9 hours ago
Author of this silly project here!
Sharing a bit of backstory on why I decided to work on this; Firstly, “for fun” but primarily because I felt like I started losing the childlike wonder/whimsy I once had with programming.
So I started this new hobby where I ask myself “can I hack on this?” upon getting/seeing something.
For instance, I got this new Aula F75 keyboard (really good keyboard for the price btw, it sounds good too!) and it only has dedicated control software for Windows. So I downloaded the driver files, software executable, and manual sheet and reverse engineered the full protocol/packets and rebuilt it for my Mac. Then played snake with the backlights. Fun.
Anywho, happy to see my blog on the front page. Would love to hear if anyones going through something similar or working on silly little projects! :)
Great post, thanks for sharing it!
When I saw the title, I thought of Lambda Calculus[0] and SKI combinators[1]. Given that there are "only six useful colors", I wonder if M&Ms could be used to implement them.
Fun project! I had a similar project a while back, but my medium of choice was the Uno card game. I called it UnoScript [1] and it had similar mechanisms as color was an important factor. I also ended with a stack as the main part of the language, where different colors/combinations of cards could read from/modify the stack. Interesting how similar constraints can lead to some similar design choices!
Does this work with real candy?
Yes! Just make sure to take a photo on a plain white surface is all.
With:
uv run mnm decompile path/to/photo.png --mode photoIt’s funny until one guy spills his bag of M&M’s and accidentally deletes the production database.
What color is your function?
It's all fun and games until some fat bastard like me decides he wants a snack. Incidentally, which flavor? Asking for a friend.
it actually sounds like a fun idea, but i have one question. do you think a lightweight CNN trained on synthetic candy layouts would outperform the deterministic decoder for messy real world photos?
This is AI slop but mildly amusing. Brainfuck did it first.
Which part made you conclude there's AI involved?
the bold section headers and bullet points. but who cares. i don't.
I literally write like the article on similar write ups, where do you think the AI's learned to write this way from.
I really don't get the AI vibes from the actual writing of it
Am I allowed to use the term psychopath in the most loving, even inspired, way?
Psychopath implies lack of empathy so I don't think that's quite the word you want. You could maybe repurpose "psychotic" though!
“ As it turned out, there is nothing special about psychopaths when it comes to understanding or feeling empathy with others. ”
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fulfillment-at-any-a...
But maybe it is like so often more about the contradictory definitions of “empathy”, and capability vs. willingness.