CoSy20160915

For far too long CoSy has been singularly my personal tool for dealing with the Business of Life . ( I apologize that that business has burdened so much of this year that my progress and support of CoSy αs has been sporadic . But it is those court interactions with rooms full of people taking $250 % hr , which justify my assertion that the most valuable act in CoSy is tapping F11 to insert a timestamp in my notes | 20160925.1446 )
Now with the USB CoSyStick , that space is already 4 dimensional ( n + 1 heads define an n dimensional space . Ergo , n heads are , the square root n better than 1 . ) And that is with only a few small groups of individuals yet knowing of its availability .

Current 4th.CoSy doesn't yet have the everyday functionality of even the original APL+PC.CoSy in the mid 1980's . That hypertext linked multiwindow environment was the the last time CoSy had multiple users . But those were very significant users .

The language , however , has evolved so that that functionality is a short distance away in terms of additional vocabulary . And those APL level definitions are building on a vocabulary of dynamic lists of lists ( simplified from Arthur Whtney's K years maintaining accounts in K.CoSy ) built in an open to the chip 0 cost base Forth .

The core of CoSy is what I've described as Captain Picard's log . It's an environment of simple text enhanced with keystrokes to do such things as insert calendar dates and time stamps . Currently there are remarkably few defined keystrokes :

|\/| ` Keyhelp |\/|

 F1    Key Help

      

 F5    Insert  res  at cursor

 F6    CoSy evaluate | requires result to be CoSy object or empty stack 

sF6    Eval line under cursor in  text in raw Forth  

cF6    Eval line in OS

      

cF9    { textwdo @ selected-text? www }  | open URL 

      

 F11    Insert timestamp ( |hm| ) at cursor

sF11    Insert timestamp ( yyyymmdd.hhmm ) at cursor 

 F12    Insert date line ( dayln ) at cursor

      

cS    saveText     

      

|/\|

The magic key is F6 . It does whatever the line the cursor is on in from searching for a line in a window of text to defining a new word .

And this in the language , transparently open down to the Intel x86 which has been winnowed since my life was changed , in part by the ability to write a definitional Fourier transform in 1 line of APL was critical to the analysis of a classical psychophysical experiment . Since then I've been driven to have my interface with my computing resources , whatever they may be , at that level of succinctness of expression and clarity of thought and immediacy of action , response and extensibility . It is to not be trapped in a MicroSoft level inscrutable concrete kindergarten .

CoSy circa 1985 on Compaq suitcase @ Peck Slip

It is that simplicity of chronicling one's daily actions and ToDos while any action from the simplest search of your accumulated data to the most sophisticated data transformations are just a short expression -- perhaps an answer to a Tweet -- you may leave sitting anywhere in your notes which made even VP at money center banks buy a CoSy to sit on their desk even tho their IT supplied PC sat unused on credenza behind them . But the simplicity also made it usable by their secretaries to augment or organize their information .

It is the dynamic lists-of-lists structure and the incomplete yet maturing APL and K informed vocabulary , the availability at my fingertips of which motivated my implementation of the most basic computations of planetary temperature make the environment a powerful Tool of Thought while also keeping your shopping lists or portfolios of notes and links on everyday tasks or serious business .

Are you an αlpha ?
The very first CoSySticks are now in α user=programmer hands and essential feedback has begun . Issues already discussed include dealing with false alarms by some virus programs to "waking up" the Linux and Apple OS versions of the Reva Forth 4th.CoSy is built in , to evaluating alternatives to the current IUP GUI interface .

If you are an αlpha and interested in joining the language community creating the future of a melding of two of the most powerful poles of computing language : APL and Forth . Get a CoSyStick . Membership in the CoSy-notes Yahoo mail group comes along with the purchase . Otherwise , questions , comments or code may be posted on the Disqus forms on most pages .

While a language community like 4th.CoSy has no value unless freely and openly available , even the business plan for the commercialization is open to discussion . Both on the instrumentation end where the APL level of concise expression of complex \/ combinatoric algorithms in chip specific Forths , or of greatest potential , migrating the essential kernel to a Forth running on a SmartPhone . Since the days of the Compaq suitcase above , CoSy has been focused on having your computing power with you .

But it all starts with purchase of a Stick .