BAA
The British APL Association (BAA; infrequently BAPLA) is a user group founded in 1984 in England to promote APL, and the publisher of Vector journal. It is funded by its sustaining members, which include corporate users and the APL vendors APL2000, Dyalog Ltd., Kx Systems, and MicroAPL.
The BAA was a Specialist Group of the British Computer Society from its early years (possibly beginning after APL86[1]) until it left in response to increasing requirements made by the BCS in 2008.[2]
Activities
Symposium
From 2008 and until the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the BAA London group arranged a monthly open-for-all meet-up, called the symposium, at the The Hoop and Grapes pub on Farringdon Street in London. No sign-up was required.
Vector journal
Vector, the journal of the BAA, began publication in 1984, and gradually took the place of APL Quote Quad as the de-facto leading publishing channel for APL content. The journal featured submitted articles on array programming including J and K, as well as news from APL and other array language vendors. Beginning in 2005, with volume 21 issue 4, the journal was issued online as well as in print, and some prior articles have also been made available online.[3] It was published quarterly until 2004, when late and sometimes skipped issues began to interrupt its formerly regular schedule. Releases slowed more significantly after 2008, and in 2016, following the completion of volume 26, the journal moved entirely to online publishing. So far a single issue has been published this way, in 2019.
BAPLA 09
The British APL Association held a 2-day conference, BAPLA 09, on June 8th & 9th 2009 at DeVere Hotel, Wokefield Park, near Reading, UK
Webinar
In response to the restrictions imposed during 2020 by the COVID-19 pandemic, BAA has arranged a series of webcasts to replace their regular monthly symposium.[4] The series proved popular, and was continued throughout 2021[5] and into 2022.[6] Initially, each event consisted of half an hour of social interaction, followed by a single presentation of about an hour, and a Q&A session, though some webinars were so-called open sessions which are more similar to the monthly symposium, in being informal meetings where APLers discuss and present whatever they feel like, with no particular subject decided on beforehand. Eventually, the series evolved so that most meetings were of this general meetup nature, with only a minority of events having an agenda. Participants are still encouraged to present or raise any subject, and can request in advance that an episode is set aside for such.
The events are held at 16:00 UK time, every other Thursday on even-numbered ISO weeks. The current week number can easily be determined using Dyalog APL: ⍬2⊃¯11⎕DT'Z' gives 5 this week.
BAA webinars are held using Zoom:
- Meeting ID: 858 532 665
- Passcode: The result of
×/1920 12 17evaluated as APL
2020
| No. | Date | Presenter(s) | Title |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Apr 9th 2020 | Richard Park, Dyalog | Molecular Dynamics-in-APL |
| 2 | Apr 23rd 2020 | MJH Software Services | Introducing qWC Alpha 0.4 |
| 3 | May 7th 2020 | Adám Brudzewsky, Dyalog | Meet the new APL Wiki |
| 4 | May 21st 2020 | Phil Last | Acre source-code manager update |
| 5 | Jun 4th 2020 | Paul Grosvenor | British APL Association AGM |
| 6 | Jun 18th 2020 | Bob Armstrong | CoSy : The Shortest Path from the Chip to the Math |
| 7 | Jul 2nd 2020 | Adám Brudzewsky | aplcart.info turns 1 |
| summer break | |||
| 8 | Aug 13th 2020 | John Jacob | BAA websites: New features |
| Ellis Morgan | An APL recreation | ||
| 9 | Aug 27th 2020 | Open Session | |
| 10 | Sep 10th 2020 | Open session | |
| 11 | Sep 24th 2020 | Ray Cannon | Using SVG from Dyalog APL for animated visualisation |
| 12 | Oct 8th 2020 | Ray Polivka | Seats in the House of Representatives |
| 13 | Oct 22nd 2020 | Open Session | |
| 14 | Nov 5th 2020 | Open session | |
| 15 | Nov 19th 2020 | Open session | |
| 16 | Dec 3th 2020 | Open session | |
| 17 | Dec 17th 2020 | Stephen Taylor | Iverson Centenary |
2021
| No. | Date | Presenter(s) | Title |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18 | Jan 14th 2021 | Open session | |
| 19 | Jan 28th 2021 | Open session | |
| 20 | Feb 11th 2021 | Open session | |
| 21 | Feb 25th 2021 | Open session | |
| 22 | Mar 11th 2021 | Open session | |
| 23 | Mar 25th 2021 | Conor Hoekstra | Algorithms as a tool of thought |
| Log-On Software | APL2 update | ||
| 24 | Apr 8th 2021 | Open session | |
| 25 | Apr 22nd 2021 | Open session | |
| 26 | May 6th 2021 | Open session | |
| 27 | May 20th 2021 | Martin Neitzel | The J Workbench |
| 28 | Jun 3rd 2021 | Open session | |
| 29 | Jun 17th 2021 | Open session | |
| 30 | Jul 1st 2021 | Paul Grosvenor | British APL Association AGM |
| 32 | Jul 15th 2021 | Open session | |
| 33 | Jul 29th 2021 | Open session | |
| 34 | Aug 12th 2021 | Paul Grosvenor | EGM to ratify changes to BAA regulations |
| 35 | Aug 26th 2021 | Open session | |
| 36 | Sep 9th 2021 | Open session | |
| 37 | Sep 23th 2021 | Open session | |
| 38 | Oct 7th 2021 | Open session | |
| 39 | Oct 21st 2021 | Open session | |
| 40 | Nov 4th 2021 | Open session | |
| 41 | Nov 18th 2021 | Open session | |
| 42 | Dec 2nd 2021 | Open session | |
| 43 | Dec 16th 2021 | Open session | |
2022
| No. | Date | Presenter(s) | Title |
|---|---|---|---|
| 44 | Jan 13th 2022 | Open session | |
| 45 | Jan 27th 2022 | Open session | |
| 46 | Feb 10th 2022 | Open session | |
| 47 | Feb 24th 2022 | Open session | |
| 48 | Mar 10th 2022 | Open session | |
| 49 | Mar 24th 2022 | Open session | |
| 50 | Apr 7th 2022 | Open session | |
| 51 | Apr 21nd 2022 | Open Session | |
| 52 | May 5th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 53 | May 19th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 54 | Jun 2nd 2022 | Open Session | |
| 55 | Jun 16th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 56 | Jun 30th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 57 | Jul 14th 2022 | Paul Grosvenor | British APL Association AGM |
| 58 | Jul 28th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 59 | Aug 11th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 60 | Aug 25th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 61 | Sep 8th 2022 | Open session | |
| 62 | Sep 22nd 2022 | Open Session | |
| 63 | Oct 6th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 64 | Oct 20th 2022 | Open Session | |
| 65 | Nov 3rd 2022 | Open session | |
| 66 | Nov 17th 2022 | Open session | |
| 67 | Dec 1st 2022 | Open session | |
| 68 | Dec 15th 2022 | Open session | |
Iverson Centenary
On 17 December 2020, a special webinar was arranged to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ken Iverson. Around 200 attendees from around the world attended as the panel consisting of Roger Hui, Leslie Goldsmith, Rebecca Kelly (of KX), Devon McCormick, Morten Kromberg, Simon Garland, and Stephen Taylor reflected on their experiences of working with and learning from Iverson. The legacy of Iverson Notation for APL, J, Q and other languages was discussed, together with the future of Iversonian notations.[7]
APL logo
- Main article: APL logo
After a consensus at the September 9th 2021 webinar, BAA headed an effort to adopt a universal vendor-agnostic logo for APL. This work concluded at the 2022-05-19 webinar.
Organisation
The BAA is administered by a committee of officers elected by ballot of Association members at the Annual General Meeting. Working groups are also established in areas such as activity planning and journal production. Offers of assistance and involvement with any Association matters are always welcomed.
Funding for the BAA comes entirely from the sustaining members. In many cases, these sustaining members also provide manpower and administrative assistance to the association at their own cost.
The current chairman is Paul Grosvenor.
External links
- BAA London Google Group announces upcoming symposiums and other events.
- The Vector archives are significant and relevant for understanding APL and related languages today
References
- ↑ Anthony Camacho. "BAA Annual General Meeting 2010". Vector journal volume 24 issue 4. 2010-12.
- ↑ Paul Grosvenor. "Changes at the BAA" (pdf). Vector journal volume 23 issue 4. 2008-09.
- ↑ Stephen Taylor. "Editorial: Discover, Learn, Profit". Vector journal volume 21 issue 4. 2005-09.
- ↑ BAA. Webinar Schedule for 2020.
- ↑ BAA. Webinar Schedule for 2021.
- ↑ BAA. Webinar Schedule for 2022.
- ↑ BAA Editor. Iverson Centenary – 17 December 2020. Jul 14, 2021.