Writing in computer code?

I'm having trouble visualizing what writing in computer code would look like... like a narrative in computer-y voice? An actual program that would perform the computer's anti-human actions if run? A bunch of if, then statements? Something else?

Any of those, though, would bore me, probably. The transition to typical narrative structure would have to happen very quickly for me. Perhaps someone more code-minded would stay with it longer, but I'm not a coder and I hate editing code.

kuwi = self.init()
content = getOriginalPost().getContent()
response = System.respond(kuwi.imagine())
System.print(response.getContent().toText())
>> Error: Eminently unreadable
>> Warning: One or more replies had non-zero exit status

How many could read it? It might make very good sense, if you sell the story to a magazine that specializes in programming, but if it's actual; code, I wouldn't have a clue what it said. I also don't see why a computer would speak in code, unless it was talking to another computer?

Source code is how humans talk to computers, not the other way around.

I believe a computer would "think" in binary, just a bunch of ones and zeros.

Eventually, a self-aware computer trying to communicate with humans might write a program that allows it translate from binary to, say, English. But it wouldn't look like any human programming, because it would be a program that the computer created.

Now, if someone had programmed the computer for some kind of communication with humans, that might work.

But, like the others above said, first and foremost it has to be readable by a human audience.

If you can figure out what sense it would make to have a loop in your story, then maybe you have a start. Computer programs are plans, not records of events.

A better analogy for a computer would be a lot file. A log of protocol messages could tell a story.

If I saw source code in a book that wasn't a guide to programming, I'd take a pass. It would be completely unreadable to me and I'd think the author was trying to impress me with their knowledge of coding instead of trying to tell a story.

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
\textbf{Aaaa\raisebox{-0.3ex}{a}%
\raisebox{-0.7ex}{aa}%
\raisebox{-1.2ex}{r}%
\raisebox{-2.2ex}{g}%
\raisebox{-4.5ex}{h}}
\end{document}

-cb


ETA: You can compile it here (http://latex.informatik.uni-halle.de/latex-online/latex.php) and see the results.

I ain't readin' it.

caw

heza said:

I'm having trouble visualizing what writing in computer code would look like... like a narrative in computer-y voice? An actual program that would perform the computer's anti-human actions if run? A bunch of if, then statements? Something else?

Click to expand...

It would be a communication language/protocol, like English is.

Humans don't communicate with each other with neural transmitters. Your internal narrative voice is mostly in English fragments and images. You don't see rod and cone firing.

Even computer programs don't "think" in the lowest level of abstraction. Source code is the wrong metaphor for computer communication.

(Plus, it would be boring.)

... did this to a limited extent in a story. A computer was one of the background characters. Story needs editing, so not sure if it counts yet?

0001110100010010101000110111011

Read Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination. I seem to remember parts of it had elements of that. Been a long time, might be wrong.

Here's one good reason not to do it. When an author tries to capture a character's dialect, unless they're veeeeerrry light-handed with it, I tend to put the book down or skim ahead to a place where that character isn't speaking anymore.

I read novels because I want to get so immersed in the story I forget I'm looking at words on a page. If you make me work too hard to understand, then I can't get immersed, and the book has no worth to me.

I even found Cormac McCarthy's lack of commas and quotation marks in The Road difficult to parse, although my brain retrained itself after about fifteen pages and I was fine after that. The harder you make me work to get into a story, the more compelling the narrative had better be.

That isn't a computer program. It is a lot like a computer log. Of course you see plenty of this kind of thing on heads-up displays in sci-fi movies. Probably it's a bit much for text where it isn't just an ignorable part of the background. But if you want to do it, here are some tips.

phantom000 said:

data/input* airprobe 6789024\\: <packet>: 7283145761...

Click to expand...

This is kind of good. One of the things about computer logs is that mixed in with the relevant information is a lot of routine status. You might also see things like

CPU utilization: 23%

Click to expand...

data/analysis: Human survivor's detected. Estimation 50-150.
data/video examination

data/examination: uniforms and markings match to data files 134197-ADFORS> Humans=members of USMC.

Click to expand...

Computer logs don't create original utterances. They are all pre-defined messages that can have some key words inserted. So I think that scene would go more like this:

Life form detected
Life form detected
Life form detected
+132 repeat messages truncated
Classifying ... human
Uniform database search ...
> FFL 37% match
> ISIS 11% match
> USAF 66% match
> USMC 83% match
> USN 55% match
Identify: USMC (confidence 77%) friendly (confidence 94%)

Click to expand...

I'd think you'd have to do it with some kind of made up coding language, not any of the existing ones, but that still made a sort of logical sense as a computer language, but that you were also able to make work as prose, so people could follow what was going on. So you'd probably need to have good knowledge of both computer code and linguistics or be ready to do lots of research into both! It will be a challenge, but the worst that can happen is it doesn't work, so you might as well take a crack at it.

It has already pointed out, computer coding is has been designed so we can understand it , is for our benefit and is used to write a list of instructions . This is then converted to machine code, for the computer to function . If you could somehow see into the workings of a computers mind , you would see machine code , a series of electrical pulses and we write that down like this 0000111100101001001100. All computers are much the same , regardless of the size .So a computer that can handle large amounts of dater is no more intelligent than the chip in you washing machine . I suggest you invent a new computer , organic or a quantum computer that operates in way that is closer to the human brain.

I have no doubt that artificial intelligence is real, and will someday produce a self-aware computer. I also have no doubt that the computer will speak in code. There is no reason to do so.

And I know I ain't reading it, either.

phantom000 said:

This is just a random thought, but has anyone ever thought about writing a story in a way that is more like source code then conventional prose?

Click to expand...

No. I don't want to read one either.

better !pout !cry
better watchout
lpr why
santa claus <north pole >town
cat /etc/passwd >list
ncheck list
ncheck list
cat list | grep naughty >nogiftlist
cat list | grep nice >giftlist
santa claus <north pole > town
who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake
who | egrep 'bad|good'
for (goodness sake) {
be good
}

As someone who spends a lot of time programming, I ain't reading it either.

Code is soulless, lifeless instructions to a hunk of metal and circuits.

I guess I could see it working in a short scene to show the process of how a computer works, somewhere in the guts of the story, perhaps, but as an opening scene, I think it would be ultra boring and dead on arrival in terms of sales.

Maybe another way to look at is the way writers handle stories where the entire book couldn't possibly be in English, like in a fantasy setting. They translate into English as they go.

So maybe the computer's thoughts are written in translated English the entire time, but the writing evolves from being more logical to something more emotional or "human" as the story progresses.

Angry Guy said:

better !pout !cry
better watchout
lpr why
santa claus <north pole >town
cat /etc/passwd >list
ncheck list
ncheck list
cat list | grep naughty >nogiftlist
cat list | grep nice >giftlist
santa claus <north pole > town
who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake
who | egrep 'bad|good'
for (goodness sake) {
be good
}

Click to expand...

Nah, that story would get bashed by the critics.

(That was brilliant)

I think the best approach would be to start by telling us, in simple prose, what the computer does. For this example, I'll call the computer DomComp.

----

…The camera mounted on the lamppost focused on the Dodge Dart as the car pulled into the driveway. When the driver got out, the camera zoomed in, and DomComp activated its facial recognition program. After a few nanoseconds spent culling the state's DMV records and comparing the driver's image to photos in the DMV's database, DomComp identified the driver as John Winston Burke.

----

Later in the story, you can “show” us DomComp evolving.

----

…On Monday, June 7, at 7:14.23 in the morning, through the eye of a traffic camera, DomComp saw a little girl walk off the sidewalk and into oncoming traffic. A few seconds later, the girl was struck and killed by a black sedan, which tried but failed to stop in time. A nanosecond after that, something happened inside ComComp’s inner workings, something DomComp could not identify.
…Every dictionary ever published was stored in DomComp’s database, and the computer perused them all in search of defining this unfamiliar . . . what? Sensation? Yes, according to the dictionaries, it was a sensation. But which sensation? DomComp searched and searched, disregarding one definition after another, until it found a word that fit.
…The word was sorrow.