Look Who's [not] Talking at PyCon

The schedule is up and it looks good. It is a mix of conference warriors plus some new blood; likewise the talks are a mix of old standards and new topics (some of the new talks are by conference warriors and vice versa).

The familiar names include Brett Cannon (cpython), Jim Baker, (jython), and Michael Foord (ironpython). There is a host of names that might be missing or might not - I can't recall if they do talks every year - but there is no Norwitz, Warsaw, Holden, or Martelli. Noticeably absent is Raymond Hettinger who has given several talks per con at several cons a year. Noticeably present is EVE Online in the form of Richard Tew and Krisjan; with the Icelandic Krona where it is I don't know how they can afford a taxi let alone air fare.

On the new list is Bill Gribble. Bill Gribble gets a free beer for having one of the best names ever (if his Mother shows up she can collect for her work, instead). I bet none of his friends ever start a story "I was having lunch with my friend Bill..." But instead always "I was having lunch with my friend Bill Gribble..." I don't know Gribble from a hole in the wall but I'll make a point of changing that.

[update] Talked to Raymond and he'll be attending, at least (barring life's usual caveats).
[updateder] As Brett and Ivan mention in the comments there is now a tier of invited talks that includes many of the "missing" conference regulars. Glad to have em, the "hall track" is my favorite and many on the invited speakers list make it so.

Post's Machine

An undergrad CompSci major, Shriphani Palakodety, posted an implementation of Post's Machine. Post's machine is a simple computer that has separate data and execution storage. Here's my implementation and my advice to Shriphani - Keep it simple! When working on hard problems post-graduation you'll find that code gets complicated of its own volition. The job of the writer is to fight it at every turn (the next guy to come along will appreciate the effort).

This version replaces the two custom containers with python dicts and moves all the complicated code to the pretty printer. A collections.defaultdict might be a slightly better choice for the 'infinite tape' that starts as all zeros. A nice thing about defaultdicts is that you can min() and max() even empty dicts.

I also did a python3.0 version which was nearly identical except for a 'with' on the file open and print-as-fucntion. Disappointingly I thought the advanced tuple unpack syntax would help in the case where a too-short tuple is padded and then the padding discarded.

# args might be a two or three tuple
a, b, c = (args + [0])[:3]

# python3 syntax
a, b, c, *ignore = args + [0]

The *ignore argument demands to be read as opposed to the [:3] trimmer on the end which keeps the low profile it deserves.

Here's the code for my Post Machine

def parse(lines):
  program = {}
  for line in lines:
    pos, action, jump = [p.strip() for p in line.split(',') + ['0']][:3]
    program[pos] = action, jump
  return program

def execute(program):
  tape = {}
  tape_pos = 0
  action = None
  action_pos = '0'

  while action != 'exit':
    action, action_pos = program[action_pos]

    pretty_tape(tape, tape_pos)

    if action == '<':
      tape_pos -= 1
    elif action == '>':
      tape_pos += 1
    elif action == 'mark':
      tape[tape_pos] = 1
    elif action == 'unmark':
      tape[tape_pos] = 0

  return tape, tape_pos

def pretty_tape(tape, tape_pos):
  if not tape:
    tape = {0:0}
  min_pos = min(tape_pos, min(tape), 0)
  max_pos = max(tape_pos, max(tape), 4)

  parts = []
  for pos in range(min_pos, max_pos + 1):
    val = tape.get(pos, 0)
    if pos == tape_pos:
      parts.append('[%d]' % val)
    else:
      parts.append('%d' % val)

  print '.....', ', '.join(parts), '.....'

if __name__ == '__main__':
  program = parse(open('post.txt'))
  execute(program)