Here is a challenge, try to define what a programming language is.

As long as we believe that it's possible to deterministically control the development of software, deterministic solutions will be the only ones that we can entertain. Only by letting go of the idea of determinism can we open up to other, less perfect ways of influencing the process.

A macro pre-processor which works as a type-aware pattern matcher can be used to transform language X into another language Y. In other words you could create a domain specific language from another language.

Apparently Einstein went to his grave believing that "God does not play dice with the universe," that the Heisenberg uncertainty principle was wrong, and that there was just some other variable that we weren't taking into account that would explain everything.

It appears that you can automatically identify and rewrite any recursive call in a stack based language like Cat, as a loop using a goto statement.

How can we see the problems that we face when building software through new eyes?

OO frameworks, especially in the C++ world, have usually shipped with source. This is often highly educational and sometimes a life-saver. Until, Apple didn't ship the Cocoa source.

Some studies have shown that reviews are a far cheaper and more efficient approach to error removal than testing. These studies don't suggest that reviews should replace testing, but that you are missing out on some big economic leverage if you don't use reviews.

Two days ago, Alan Kay gave a very inspiring keynote here at EuroPython. I can't possibly do it justice but I want to describe it anyway.

When two stacks are better than one. Also an introduction to the type annotation syntax which will be introduced in an upcoming version of Cat.

In the fairly famous "Defense Science Board Task Force on Military Software" released in the late 1980s, recommedation 29 was to "...develop economic incentives...to allow contractors to profit from offering modules for reuse..."

Given a solid OO education and C++ background but having missed some of the traditional CS language theory, what is a minimum required reading list, especially when designing a non-traditional language?

I've just released a new version of Cat, and it is leaner and meaner than ever. There have been syntax changes, and I attempt to provide a brief but useful tutorial.

Pattern matching is much maligned by object-oriented programmers. I wonder why?

I am examing the meaning of purity with regards to functions in an attempt to close the gap between imperative and functional languages.