alt.hn

5/17/2025 at 6:21:18 PM

Mystical

 https://suberic.net/~dmm/projects/mystical/README.html

by mmphosis

5/17/2025 at 7:37:36 PM

Reminds me of japanese anime Dennō Coil, where kids would draw computer programs almost exactly like the author’s on the floor and invoke them as some kind of enchantement. Highly recommend it!

by anpep

5/17/2025 at 9:21:04 PM

I loved that show. It showed how children deal with new technology different from how adults deal with it. It predated even google glass by half a decade.

by blkhawk

5/17/2025 at 11:08:40 PM

I should rewatch that. There’s many shows that get worse over time, but I just don’t think anything has changed in regards to DC. Even now it’ll seem like pure magic, but just close enough to believable you might see it in your lifetime.

Of course my lifetime has marched on relentlessly since I first saw it.

by Aeolun

5/18/2025 at 12:34:00 AM

I came here to say exactly the same thing! What a great show.

by cardamomo

5/17/2025 at 9:57:11 PM

This must be the preferred programming language of the otherworldly main character of Aphyr's "Xing the technical interview" sequence of blog posts [1]. Would definitely deserve its own entry in the series.

[1] https://aphyr.com/posts/354-unifying-the-technical-interview

by Sharlin

5/18/2025 at 4:07:47 PM

I would actually love to use this for a programming interview in real life.

by pcthrowaway

5/18/2025 at 9:11:03 AM

I wasn't aware of this, thanks for posting! Very amusing.

by awanderingmind

5/18/2025 at 7:05:36 AM 

    BEFOREHAND: close door, each window & exit; wait until time.
        open spellbook, study, read (scan, select, tell us);
     write it, print the hex while each watches,
        reverse its length, write again;
        kill spiders, pop them, chop, split, kill them.
            unlink arms, shift, wait & listen (listening, wait),
    ...
— Anonymous, "Black Perl" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Perl

by rgovostes

5/18/2025 at 9:36:14 AM

This is incredible, what's the license of the work? A derivative of this (using a forth-like with only recursion) would be perfect for the current game project where I'm lacking a visual representation of spells (both written and animated). Mystical provides the missing piece of the puzzle of how users could write their own spells in a structured way within the game and still feel as if it's part of the game world with the same kind of thinking as in regular programming.

by tauoverpi

5/18/2025 at 4:17:16 PM

I've been working on one of these too! Mine's based on Dusa, a logic lang which has the nice property that the order of instructions don't matter. This gives a lot of options for making really expressive, dense runes but making a program that lays it out automatically has been challenging. It's also nowhere near as readable as Mystical for better or worse.

Here's a sample that plays Rock Paper Scissors: https://sunny.garden/@spenc/113870784615196721

by spencerflem

5/19/2025 at 9:28:29 AM

Wow, that's gorgeous.

by camtarn

5/18/2025 at 8:11:30 PM

it does look just as beautiful though.

by em-bee

5/18/2025 at 1:41:28 AM

For game purposes I've been looking up alchemical and mystical symbols, and I've been frustrated that, while there's a lot of references of symbols, alphabets, etc. themselves, there's little or no presentation of a grammar that would direct one in creating larger diagrams that look like this. This is amazing. It's deeply pleasing that code, represented systematically, would be so aesthetically pleasing.

by fatbird

5/17/2025 at 11:28:27 PM

This is neography meets conlang. Love it. I would really love to see a unique programming language that uses a constructed language with a beautiful script. I had the idea of making one but I never got around to it.

by aspizu

5/18/2025 at 9:50:09 PM

Oh wow, I had to try this and as expected it's amazing. Trying to design interesting algorithms that also look good is a lot of fun, and the result is surprisingly readable.

It takes some getting used to symbols that can be confused when upside down such as b or brackets (like the symbols for begin/end)

Like others I am curious about doing it for a lisp or Forth

by areeh

5/17/2025 at 9:20:54 PM

Torres Quevedo did it first but with symbols on mechanic hardware and processes.

Also, Babbage with literal gears. Look up for electromechanical computation.

by anthk

5/18/2025 at 12:29:19 AM

I call upon thе blood-moon goddess, for I have but one request. I've laid the altar, charged the crystals, the circle, I have blessed. PLEASE boot this time.

by buildsjets

5/18/2025 at 1:25:19 AM

Knock the candle from scripture stack

by 01HNNWZ0MV43FF

5/18/2025 at 3:42:00 AM

Very cool - it reminds me of some of the programming-language-like magic systems in Sanderson's books, especially AonDor in Elantris and Lines in The Rithmatist.

by gonepivoting

5/18/2025 at 1:40:03 AM

This has uses right? A prettier form of QR code? Would be a tad difficult to decode automatically but I definitely like the combination of aesthetics with logic.

by globalnode

5/19/2025 at 1:26:39 AM

Theologically speaking, there is an important distinction between magic, or sorcery, and mysticism. Sorcery is an attempt to twist or subvert the divine while mysticism is an attempt to uncover it.

For example, Hildegard von Bingen is a mystic while Heinrich Faust would be considered a sorcerer. The distinction is important as mysticism is considered a holy activity while sorcery is considered to be a profound sin.

Meditation and esoteric study would fall under the realm of mysticism, while things like divination or the dishonest manipulation of belief would be considered sorcery.

by bdbenton5255

5/18/2025 at 8:29:14 AM

This actually seems rather usable! It is rare that an esolang focused on aesthetics is so readable and relatively easy to use.

And this idea can probably be applied for any Lisp-like, any stack based language or array language.

With the right structured editor, it could be used for legitimate programming, it might even be more compact and readable at a glance than some code.

by oersted

5/18/2025 at 4:09:14 PM

Hah, who's the wizard now, APL programmers?

by ykonstant

5/17/2025 at 8:50:18 PM

Dude, the Laundry is trying to relax on the weekend. Don’t make them call the Plumbers out.

by philodeon

5/18/2025 at 12:11:34 AM

I suspect the new management has them occupied.

by spauldo

5/18/2025 at 11:26:50 AM

One of the Phang’s or the 1st of Liars should be free though.

by FridgeSeal

5/18/2025 at 1:30:44 AM

Couldn't think of any applications of this outside of doing actual magic. But this is awesome still!

by hojinkoh

5/18/2025 at 3:05:44 AM

Very cute. If you squint, it's almost APL written in a circles.

by rdtsc

5/18/2025 at 8:50:26 AM

PostScript (with its reverse Polish notation) rewires brain on its own (it is top 1 in languages that "made me think different). Adding esoteric visuals is a nice touch.

by stared

5/18/2025 at 9:09:30 AM

Other languages please? Would be cool to have a rewire your brain, and train you briefly in things like ps and lisp.

by keepamovin

5/18/2025 at 12:21:02 PM

Every language rewired my brain, as you need to think in a different way. But nothing felt like using PostScript. I guess if I tried to use Assembly (well, my only experience is through playing Shenzhen I/O), the difference would be even more profound.

For many people, functional languages were a big paradigm shift. For me, not so much — my background is in mathematics and theoretical physics, so the functional way is the default way of doing things. So, for me, the functional approach (be it in JavaScript or Rust) brings comfort rather than enlightenment.

It’s always contextual, based on what you already know. Maybe if someone speaks German natively, PostScript comes more naturally — who knows.

by stared

5/18/2025 at 3:27:39 PM

Declarative languages are fun. Prolog is the iconic one. You may be more familiar with Make.

For OO, every serious software engineer should read The Art of the Metaobject Protocol sometime in their lives.

by NelsonMinar

5/18/2025 at 6:04:47 AM

The sigil feel of this feels like the premise of a movie

by leke

5/18/2025 at 11:06:56 AM

It has been kind of made into a movie! The Heptapods [0] in Arrival (2016) written script is a circular shape with each subsection of the shape conveying a different meaning ultimately representing a concept or thought. A quote from the movie:

> Like their ship or their bodies, their written language has no forward or backward direction. Linguists call this "nonlinear orthography", which raises the question: Is this how they think?

While the movie explores philosophical questions other than "Arrival" and does a quiet beautiful job at that, actual linguistic experts have helped making it and it has been praised for its accuracy. I suggest you give it a go.

[0]: https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/Heptapod

by faresahmed

5/23/2025 at 7:01:23 PM

I'd like this with EForth/Forth.

by anthk

5/19/2025 at 2:11:09 AM

Looks basically like the Logo language, except with more sigils and less turtle.

by hvis

5/18/2025 at 10:37:56 AM

This is the coolest thing I've seen in years.

by QuesnayJr

5/17/2025 at 9:18:30 PM

Very cool!

by joisig

5/17/2025 at 8:32:15 PM

Awesome.

by roymurdock

5/17/2025 at 9:48:03 PM

cool!!!

by tehasem

5/18/2025 at 12:27:39 AM

Holy shit this is awesome. Absolutely beautiful.

by tines