lignuist

Nitpicking much?

As I wrote above, by making sure that I use a placeholder that does not appear in the data, I make sure that it does not cause the issues you describe. And if I was wrong with that assumption, I can at least minimize the effect by choosing a very unlikely sequence as placeholder.

I really see no issue here. How do you find valid grammars for fuzzy data in practice?

I'm not sure if interchangeable is the right word. 'phởne' and 'phone' yield different result lists.

At least Google seems to have a way to detect visually similar letters.

I wonder how many potential user are lost due to ungoogleability. :O)

The idea is to be able to write code in one language and use this code in many different languages.

I used that strategy for parsing gigabytes of CSVs containing arbitrary natural language from the web - try to get these files fixed, or figure out a grammar for gigabytes of fuzzy data...

My approach never failed for me, so telling me that my strategy does not work is a strong claim, where it reliably did the job for me.

Your examples are all valid, but what you are describing are theoretical attacks on the method, while the method works in almost all cases in practice. We are talking about two different viewpoints: dealing with large amounts of messy data on one hand and parser theory in an ideal cosmos on the other hand.

> What if there is #COMMA, in one of the fields (but no #COMMA#)?

What should happen? Since #COMMA is not #COMMA#, it gets not replaced, because it does not match.

Please keep in mind, that I replied to suni's very specific question and did not try to start a discussion about general parser theory. In practice, we find a lot of files that do not respect the grammar, but still need to find a way to make the data accessible.

You just choose a placeholder that does not appear in the data. You could even implement it in a way that a placeholder is automatically selected upfront that does not appear in the data.

When it comes to parsing, the thing is that you usually have to make some assumptions about the document structure.

I was referencing to "What if the character separating fields is not a comma?".

And there it clearly works. I used this technique a few times with success. If you find a CSV file that has mixed field separator types, then you probably found a broken CSV file.

You can replace all commas with a placeholder (e.g. "#COMMA#"), replace the delimiter with a comma, parse the document and then replace all placeholders in the data with ",".

My perspective on art is a reaction on the elitism of the art scene, so basically my comments are art.

Edit/addition: Honestly, I could have much more respect for this project, if Wu-Tang made it only accessible to homeless people, or only to prisoners, but effectively, they make it only accessible to the riches. I really do like the Wu-Tang Clan, but I am really not impressed by this stunt.

> He continued: "I don't know how to measure it, but it gives us an idea that what we're doing is being understood by some. And there are some good peers of mine also, who are very high-ranking in the film business and the music business, sending me a lot of good will. It's been real positive.

So Wu-Tang Clan fans in Kazakhstan or Tanzania (or even every country other than the U.S.) will probably never be able to listen to this album...? I guess these will be the people who don't "understand" what Wu-Tang Clan is doing, while only the privileged ones "understand" the concept.

That's artificial shortage, not art (not talking about the music itself).

What is wrong with just offering a reader without forcing its users to also buy the books from the same source?

I own a Sony reader and I actually enjoy that it is not tightly bundled with a bookstore.