Alan Dipert The Homepage™

TechWorks

I've built programming tools, small languages, and systems that make computation easier to see and/or think about. This page starts with the things I've made recently, then gathers the talks, papers, interviews, teaching, and older software I've been involved with.

Building now

  • GridCalc is an RPN spreadsheet for iOS. The grid is both the calculation and its visible history.
  • Klong for the Web puts Nils M Holm’s real Klong interpreter in an offline-capable browser notebook.
  • Actor Agents and Programmable Phones record current experiments with capable, constrained software and personal tools built with AI assistance.

Earlier work

Languages and interfaces

I created the Scala framework Step, which became Scalatra. Later I co-created Boot with Micha Niskin and helped build Hoplon and Javelin. Those projects treated builds and web interfaces as programs instead of piles of configuration. Gherkin, JACL, and talks such as Programming with Values in Clojure came from the same interest in small languages and direct models.

Software in production

At RStudio I contributed to Shiny, shinyloadtest, shinycannon, httpuv, and shinydashboard. My public work from that period includes Make Shiny fast by doing as little work as possible, load-testing tools, integration testing, and connecting React components to Shiny applications.

Teaching and preservation

I have taught Clojure in workshops and courses, spoken about Common Lisp, Scala, Raspberry Pi, Git, testing, and functional programming, and written the foreword to Clojure for the Brave and True. I also originated fswatch, recovered NCSA Mosaic’s public source history, and restored early, cringey work such as ProblemScan.

The role-labeled software history is in Open Source. Copies and Downloads keeps papers, slides, recordings, transcripts, and source snapshots together by work. Selected early essays are in Recovered Technical Writing.

Complete chronology

Date Venue Title Format Role With
2021-01-28 SciCloj Common Lisp for the Curious Clojurian Meetup Presenter
2020-12-23 ClojureScript Podcast S4 E19: Hoplon Interview Interviewee Jacek Schae
2020-04-28 ELS JACL: A Common Lisp for Developing Single-Page Web Applications Presentation Presenter
2020-04-27 ELS JACL: A Common Lisp for Developing Single-Page Web Applications Academic Paper Author
2020-01-31 rstudio::conf Integration Testing in Shiny Apps and Modules Poster Presenter
2019-12-11 WWW Just Lisp Things Blog Author
2019-11-19 OCRUG Integrating React.js and Shiny, code Presentation Presenter
2019-11-16 OCRUG OCRUG interview Interview Interviewee
2019-11-06 BBSW Software Engineering with Shiny Presentation Presenter
2019-01-24 rstudio::conf Integrating React.js and Shiny Presentation Presenter
2018-12-17 Orange Combinator Old School FP: A Common Lisp Experience Report Meetup Presenter
2018-09-06 rstudio.com Load testing Shiny Webinar Presenter
2018-02-02 rstudio::conf Make Shiny fast by doing as little work as possible, slides Presentation Presenter
2018-01-31 rstudio::conf Intermediate Shiny, materials Workshop Teaching assistant
2017-12-11 RStudio blog Shiny Server (Pro) 1.5.6 Article Author
2017-10-13 WWW Wondr: Thoughts on R programming Blog Author
2017-09-12 RStudio blog Shiny Server (Pro) 1.5.4 Article Author
2016-11-03 The Cognicast Episode 112 Interview Interviewee Craig Andera, Micha Niskin
2016-10-18 The Cognicast Episode 111 Interview Interviewee Craig Andera, Micha Niskin
2015-11-06 Øredev Programmable Builds with Boot Presentation Presenter
2015-11-04 Øredev Hoplon: A Simpler Way to Program the Web Presentation Presenter
2015-10-02 ClojureBridge ClojureBridge Durham Workshop Teaching assistant Yoko Harada
2015-10-01 No Starch Press Clojure for the Brave and True, foreword Book Foreword, technical editor Daniel Higginbotham
2015-04-20 Clojure/West Boot Can Build It, slides Presentation Presenter Micha Niskin
2014-03-24 Clojure/West Web Programming with Hoplon Presentation Presenter Micha Niskin
2014-03-18 The Cognicast Episode 52 Interview Interviewee Craig Andera
2014-02-27 TriClojure Hoplon Presentation Presenter Micha Niskin
2013-11-14 Clojure/conj Gherkin, a Lisp 1 in Bash 4, code Lightning talk Presenter
2013-03-18 Clojure/West FRP in ClojureScript with Javelin, slides Presentation Presenter
2013-01-10 TriLUG An Introduction to Raspberry Pi, slides, BerryCam Presentation Presenter Pete Soper, Clinton Dreisbach, Peter Reintjes
2012-11-16 Clojure/conj FRP in ClojureScript with Flapjax, code, demo Lightning talk Presenter
2012-10-06 BarCamp Rochester 10 Your Own Compiler in 20 Minutes, source Presentation Presenter
2012-07-19 OSCON Computing with Clojure, source Workshop Trainer Clinton Dreisbach
2012-07-13 Pluralsight Clojure Fundamentals - Part 1 Course Trainer Craig Andera
2012-03-16 Clojure/West Programming with Values in Clojure, slides Presentation Presenter
2011-11-12 Clojure/conj Uberlisp, a Lisp for Arduino, code Lightning talk Presenter Jon Distad
2011-08-25 The Ruby Hoedown V Functional Programming with Ruby Presentation Presenter
2009-12-11 WWW Managing Code and Quality with Git and Testing Presentation Presenter Julio Capote
2009-09-03 Rochester Hackers Scala, a Scalable Language Presentation Presenter
2005-01-14 Linux.com My workstation OS: NetBSD, local copy Article Author
2000-02-27 Planet Source Code ProblemScan v1.0, recovered Visual Basic source and submission archive Source code Author