
Fly Straight, Dammit (2019) - lelf
http://www.petecorey.com/blog/2019/08/12/fly-straight-dammit/
======
wruza

      a_a =: 1 + +
      a_b =: [ % +.
    
      py (a_b ` a_a @. has_gcd) y
    

I know it is math and all that, but when we commit something like this at day
job, it doesn’t give you applause. Can the idea of the article be expressed in
more readable/obvious form? Or is that an alphabet that you should learn first
before solving that?

~~~
wodenokoto
It’s a problem without solutions, when implementing from a mathematical
definition.

Either you write it so it is “easy” to understand or you write it so it is
easy to compare with the source equation.

Both have pros and cons.

------
why-oh-why
It looks like they’re two separate functions merged under a condition. Any 2
functions can generate a “fly straight, dammit” graph. What’s the point of
this?

~~~
sixstringtheory
Any two functions when glued together as a piecewise function can have a
discontinuity, that's true, but that’s not what this is... this is a sequence
with a recursive term. Sort of like the fibonacci sequence where a term is
defined by the one preceding it, so you have to, conceptually, computer all
the way down to the base case. It just so happens that the rule in this
article for some reason becomes very well ordered past a certain step when you
plot the values, at least to our human brains.

The numberphile video to which the article links is a good watch!

