Naming conventions make it easier for other people to find things.
Just like with file prefixes, I like to use a standard naming pattern
for our BigBlueButton web conference rooms. For EmacsConf 2022, we
used ec22-day-am-gen Speaker name (slugs). For
EmacsConf 2023, I want to set up the BigBlueButton rooms before the
schedule settles down, so I won't encode the time or track information
into it. Instead, I'll use Speaker name (slugs) - emacsconf2023.
BigBlueButton does have an API for managing rooms, but that requires a
shared secret that I don't know yet. I figured I'd just automate it
through my browser. Over the last year, I've started using Spookfox to
control the Firefox web browser from Emacs. It's been pretty handy for
scrolling webpages up and down, so I wondered if I could replace my
old xdotool-based automation. Here's what I came up with for this
year.
First, I need a function that creates the BBB room for a group of
talks and updates the Org entry with the URL. Adding a slight delay
makes it a bit more reliable.
emacsconf-spookfox-create-bbb: Create a BBB room for this group of talks.
Sometimes it makes sense to dynamically generate information related
to a talk and then save it as an Org property so that I can manually
edit it. For example, we like to name all the talk files using this
pattern: "emacsconf-year-slug--title--speakers". That's a lot to
type consistently! We can generate most of these prefixes
automatically, but some might need tweaking, like when the talk title
or speaker names have special characters.
First we need something that turns a string into an ID.
emacsconf-slugify: Turn S into an ID.
(defunemacsconf-slugify (s)
"Turn S into an ID.Replace spaces with dashes, remove non-alphanumeric characters,and downcase the string."
(replace-regexp-in-string
" +""-"
(replace-regexp-in-string
"[^a-z0-9 ]"""
(downcase s))))
Then we can use that to calculate the file prefix for a given talk.
emacsconf-file-prefix: Create the file prefix for TALK
Then we can map over all the talk entries that don't have FILE_PREFIX defined:
emacsconf-set-file-prefixes: Set the FILE_PREFIX property for each talk entry that needs it.
(defunemacsconf-set-file-prefixes ()
"Set the FILE_PREFIX property for each talk entry that needs it."
(interactive)
(org-map-entries
(lambda ()
(org-entry-put
(point) "FILE_PREFIX"
(emacsconf-file-prefix (emacsconf-get-talk-info-for-subtree))))
"SLUG={.}-FILE_PREFIX={.}"))
That stores the file prefix in an Org property, so we can edit it if
it needs tweaking.
Figure 1: Setting the FILE_PREFIX for all talks that don't have that yet
Renaming files to match the file prefix
Now that we have that, how can we use it? One way is to rename files
from within Emacs. I can mark multiple files with Dired's m command
or work on them one at a time. If there are several files with the
same extension, I can specify something to add to the filename to tell
them apart.
emacsconf-rename-files: Rename the marked files or the current file to match TALK.
(defunemacsconf-rename-files (talk &optional filename)
"Rename the marked files or the current file to match TALK.If FILENAME is specified, use that as the extra part of the filename after the prefix.This is useful for distinguishing files with the same extension.Return the list of new filenames."
(interactive (list (emacsconf-complete-talk-info)))
(prog1
(mapcar
(lambda (file)
(let* ((extra
(or filename
(read-string (format "Filename (%s): " (file-name-base file)))))
(new-filename
(expand-file-name
(concat (plist-get talk :file-prefix)
(if (string= extra "")
""
(concat "--" extra))
"."
(file-name-extension file))
(file-name-directory file))))
(rename-file file new-filename t)
new-filename))
(or (dired-get-marked-files) (list (buffer-file-name))))
(when (derived-mode-p 'dired-mode)
(revert-buffer))))
Figure 2: Renaming multiple files
Working with files on other computers
Because Dired works over TRAMP, I can use that to rename files on a
remote server without changing anything about the code. I can open the
remote directory with Dired and everything just works.
TRAMP also makes it easy to copy a file to the backstage directory
after it's renamed, which saves me having to do that as a separate
step.
emacsconf-rename-and-upload-to-backstage: Rename marked files or the current file, then upload to backstage.
(defunemacsconf-rename-and-upload-to-backstage (talk &optional filename)
"Rename marked files or the current file, then upload to backstage."
(interactive (list (emacsconf-complete-talk-info)))
(mapc
(lambda (file)
(copy-file
file
(expand-file-name
(file-name-nondirectory file)
emacsconf-backstage-dir)
t))
(emacsconf-rename-files talk)))
So if my emacsconf-backstage-dir is set to
/ssh:orga@res:/var/www/res.emacsconf.org/2023/backstage, then it
looks up the details for res in my ~/.ssh/config and copies the
file there.
Renaming files using information from a JSON
What if I don't want to rename the files from Emacs? If I use Emacs's
JSON support to export some information from the talks as a JSON file,
then I can easily use that data from the command line.
Here's how I export the talk information:
emacsconf-talks-json: Return JSON format with a subset of talk information.
(defunemacsconf-publish-talks-json ()
"Return JSON format with a subset of talk information."
(json-encode
(list
:talks
(mapcar
(lambda (o)
(apply
'list
(cons :start-time (format-time-string "%FT%T%z" (plist-get o :start-time) t))
(cons :end-time (format-time-string "%FT%T%z" (plist-get o :end-time) t))
(mapcar
(lambda (field)
(cons field (plist-get o field)))
'(:slug:title:speakers:pronouns:pronunciation:url:track:file-prefix))))
(emacsconf-filter-talks (emacsconf-get-talk-info))))))
emacsconf-publish-talks-json-to-files
(defunemacsconf-publish-talks-json-to-files ()
"Export talk information as JSON so that we can use it in shell scripts."
(interactive)
(mapc (lambda (dir)
(when (and dir (file-directory-p dir))
(with-temp-file (expand-file-name "talks.json" dir)
(insert (emacsconf-talks-json)))))
(list emacsconf-res-dir emacsconf-ansible-directory)))
Then I can use something like rename-original.sh emacsconf
video.webm to
emacsconf-2023-emacsconf--emacsconforg-how-we-use-org-mode-and-tramp-to-organize-and-run-a-multitrack-conference--sacha-chua--original.webm.
Working with PsiTransfer-uploaded files
JSON support is useful for getting files into our system, too. For
EmacsConf 2022, we used PsiTransfer as a password-protected web-based
file upload service. That was much easier for speakers to deal with
than FTP, especially for large files. PsiTransfer makes a JSON file
for each batch of uploads, which is handy because the uploaded files
are named based on the key instead of keeping their filenames and
extensions. I wrote a function to copy an uploaded file from the
PsiTransfer directory to the backstage directory, renaming it along
the way. That meant that I could open the JSON for the uploaded files
via TRAMP and then copy a file between two remote directories without
manually downloading it to my computer.
emacsconf-upload-copy-from-json: Parse PsiTransfer JSON files and copy the uploaded file to the backstage directory.
(defunemacsconf-upload-copy-from-json (talk key filename)
"Parse PsiTransfer JSON files and copy the uploaded file to the backstage directory.The file is associated with TALK. KEY identifies the file in a multi-file upload.FILENAME specifies an extra string to add to the file prefix if needed."
(interactive (let-alist (json-parse-string (buffer-string) :object-type'alist)
(list (emacsconf-complete-talk-info)
.metadata.key
(read-string (format "Filename: ")))))
(let ((new-filename (concat (plist-get talk :file-prefix)
(if (string= filename "")
filename
(concat "--" filename))
"."
(let-alist (json-parse-string (buffer-string) :object-type'alist)
(file-name-extension .metadata.name)))))
(copy-file
key
(expand-file-name new-filename emacsconf-backstage-dir)
t)))
So that's how I can handle things that can be mostly automated but
that might need a little human intervention: use Emacs Lisp to make a
starting point, tweak it a little if needed, and then make it easy to
use that value elsewhere. Renaming files can be tricky, so it's good
to reduce the chance for typos!
Having helped organize EmacsConf for a number of years now, I know
that I usually panic about whether we have submissions partway through
the call for participation. This causes us to extend the CFP deadline
and ask people to ask more people to submit things, and then we end up
with a wonderful deluge of talks that I then have to somehow squeeze
into a reasonable-looking schedule.
This year, I managed to not panic and I also resisted the urge to extend the
CFP deadline, trusting that there will actually be tons of cool stuff.
It helped that my schedule SVG code let me visualize what the
conference could feel like with the submissions so far, so we started
with a reasonably nice one-track conference and built up from there.
It also helped that I'd gone back to the submissions for 2022 and
plotted them by the number of weeks before the CFP deadline, and I
knew that there'd be a big spike from all those people whose Org
DEADLINE: properties would nudge them into finalizing their
proposals.
Out of curiosity, I wanted to see how the stats for this year compared
with previous years. I wrote a small function to collect the data that I wanted to summarize:
emacsconf-count-submissions-by-week: Count submissions in INFO by distance to CFP-DEADLINE.
(defunemacsconf-count-submissions-by-week (&optional info cfp-deadline)
"Count submissions in INFO by distance to CFP-DEADLINE."
(setq cfp-deadline (or cfp-deadline emacsconf-cfp-deadline))
(setq info (or info (emacsconf-get-talk-info)))
(cons '("Weeks to CFP end date""Count""Hours")
(mapcar (lambda (entry)
(list (car entry)
(length (cdr entry))
(apply '+ (mapcar 'cdr (cdr entry)))))
(seq-group-by
'car
(sort
(seq-keep
(lambda (o)
(and (emacsconf-publish-talk-p o)
(plist-get o :date-submitted)
(cons (floor (/ (days-between (plist-get o :date-submitted) cfp-deadline)
7.0))
(string-to-number
(or (plist-get o :video-duration)
(plist-get o :time)
"0")))))
info)
(lambda (a b) (< (car a) (car b))))))))
and then I ran it against the different files for each year, filling
in the previous years' data as needed. The resulting table is pretty
long, so I've put that in a collapsible section.
Some talks were proposed off-list and are not captured here, and
cancelled or withdrawn talks weren't included either. The times for
previous years use the actual video time, and the times for this year
use proposed times.
Off the top of my head, I didn't know of an easy way to make a pivot
table or cross-tab using just Org Mode or Emacs Lisp. I tried using
datamash, but I was having a hard time getting my output just the way
I wanted it. Fortunately, it was super-easy to get my data from an Org
table into Python so I could use pandas.pivot_table. Because I had
used #+NAME: submissions-by-week to label the table, I could use
:var data=submissions-by-week to refer to the data in my Python
program. Then I could summarize them by week.
Here's the number of submissions by the number of weeks to the
original CFP deadline, so we can see people generally like to target
the CFP date.
import pandas as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
df= pd.DataFrame(data[1:], columns=data[0])
df= pd.pivot_table(df, columns=['Year'], index=['Weeks to CFP'], values='Count', aggfunc='sum', fill_value=0).iloc[::-1].sort_index(ascending=True)
fig, ax= plt.subplots()
figure= df.plot(title='Number of submissions by number of weeks to the CFP end date', ax=ax)
for line in ax.get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
for line in plt.legend().get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
figure.get_figure().savefig('number-of-submissions.png')
return df
Weeks to CFP
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
-12
0
0
0
0
4
-9
0
0
0
0
2
-8
0
0
4
2
0
-7
0
0
2
0
2
-6
0
0
1
0
0
-5
2
1
2
2
2
-4
1
1
2
0
2
-3
0
0
5
2
3
-2
6
1
1
2
5
-1
9
4
12
8
10
0
9
21
13
8
8
1
0
7
1
5
1
2
1
0
1
0
0
Calculating the cumulative number of submissions might be more useful.
Here, each row shows the number received so far.
import pandas as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
df= pd.DataFrame(data[1:], columns=data[0])
df= pd.pivot_table(df, columns=['Year'], index=['Weeks to CFP'], values='Count', aggfunc='sum', fill_value=0).iloc[::-1].sort_index(ascending=True).cumsum()
fig, ax= plt.subplots()
figure= df.plot(title='Cumulative submissions by number of weeks to the CFP end date', ax=ax)
for line in ax.get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
for line in plt.legend().get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
figure.get_figure().savefig('cumulative-submissions.png')
return df
Weeks to CFP
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
-12
0
0
0
0
4
-9
0
0
0
0
6
-8
0
0
4
2
6
-7
0
0
6
2
8
-6
0
0
7
2
8
-5
2
1
9
4
10
-4
3
2
11
4
12
-3
3
2
16
6
15
-2
9
3
17
8
20
-1
18
7
29
16
30
0
27
28
42
24
38
1
27
35
43
29
39
2
28
35
44
29
39
Figure 1: Cumulative submissions by number of weeks to CFP end date
And here's the cumulative number of minutes based on the proposals.
import pandas as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
df= pd.DataFrame(data[1:], columns=data[0])
df= pd.pivot_table(df, columns=['Year'], index=['Weeks to CFP'], values='Minutes', aggfunc='sum', fill_value=0).iloc[::-1].sort_index(ascending=True).cumsum()
fig, ax= plt.subplots()
figure= df.plot(title='Cumulative minutes by number of weeks to the CFP end date', ax=ax)
for line in ax.get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
for line in plt.legend().get_lines():
if line.get_label() =='2023':
line.set_linewidth(5)
figure.get_figure().savefig('cumulative-minutes.png')
return df
Weeks to CFP
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
-12
0
0
0
0
70
-9
0
0
0
0
100
-8
0
0
50
25
100
-7
0
0
67
25
130
-6
0
0
74
25
130
-5
45
10
96
56
160
-4
66
25
115
56
220
-3
66
25
188
87
260
-2
192
55
198
104
390
-1
274
123
361
295
570
0
422
547
558
405
710
1
422
699
568
512
730
2
429
699
578
512
730
Figure 2: Cumulative minutes by number of weeks to the CFP end date
So… yeah… 730 minutes of talks for this year… I might've gotten
a little carried away. But I like all the talks! And I want them to be
captured in videos and maybe even transcribed by people who will take
the time to change misrecognized words like Emax into Emacs! And I
want people to be able to connect with other people who are interested
in the sorts of stuff they're doing! So we're going to make it happen.
The draft schedule's looking pretty full, but I think it'll work out,
especially if the speakers send in their videos on time. Let's see how
it all works out!
(…and look, I even got to learn how to do pivot tables and graphs with
Python!)
_xor had an interesting idea: can we use org-protocol to link to
things inside Emacs, so that we can have a webpage with bookmarks into
our Org files? Here's a quick hack that reuses org-store-link and
org-link-open.
(defunorg-protocol-open-link (info)
"Process an org-protocol://open style url with INFO."
(org-link-open (car (org-element-parse-secondary-string (plist-get info :link) '(link)))))
(defunorg-protocol-copy-open-link (arg)
(interactive"P")
(kill-new (concat "org-protocol://open?link=" (url-hexify-string (org-store-link arg)))))
(with-eval-after-load'org
(add-to-list 'org-protocol-protocol-alist'("org-open":protocol"open":function org-protocol-open-link)))
To make exporting and following easier, we also need a little code to
handle org-protocol links inside Org.
People submit proposals for EmacsConf sessions via e-mail following
this submission template. (You can still submit a proposal until Sept 14!)
I mostly handle acceptance and scheduling, so I copy this information
into our private conf.org file so that we can use it to plan the draft
schedule, mail-merge speakers, and so on. I used to do this manually,
but I'm experimenting with using functions to create the heading
automatically so that it includes the date, talk title, and e-mail
address from the e-mail, and it calculates the notification date for
early acceptances as well. I use Notmuch for e-mail, so I can get the
properties from (notmuch-show-get-message-properties).
Figure 1: E-mail submission
emacsconf-mail-add-submission: Add the submission from the current e-mail.
(defunemacsconf-mail-add-submission (slug)
"Add the submission from the current e-mail."
(interactive"MTalk ID: ")
(let* ((props (notmuch-show-get-message-properties))
(from (or (plist-get (plist-get props :headers) :Reply-To)
(plist-get (plist-get props :headers) :From)))
(body (plist-get
(car
(plist-get props :body))
:content))
(date (format-time-string "%Y-%m-%d"
(date-to-time (plist-get (plist-get props :headers) :Date))))
(to-notify (format-time-string
"%Y-%m-%d"
(time-add
(days-to-time emacsconf-review-days)
(date-to-time (plist-get (plist-get props :headers) :Date)))))
(data (emacsconf-mail-parse-submission body)))
(when (string-match "<\\(.*\\)>" from)
(setq from (match-string 1 from)))
(with-current-buffer
(find-file emacsconf-org-file)
;; go to the submissions entry
(goto-char (org-find-property "CUSTOM_ID""submissions"))
(when (org-find-property "CUSTOM_ID" slug)
(error"Duplicate talk ID")))
(find-file emacsconf-org-file)
(delete-other-windows)
(outline-next-heading)
(org-insert-heading)
(insert " " (or (plist-get data :title) "") "\n")
(org-todo "TO_REVIEW")
(org-entry-put (point) "CUSTOM_ID" slug)
(org-entry-put (point) "SLUG" slug)
(org-entry-put (point) "TRACK""General")
(org-entry-put (point) "EMAIL" from)
(org-entry-put (point) "DATE_SUBMITTED" date)
(org-entry-put (point) "DATE_TO_NOTIFY" to-notify)
(when (plist-get data :time)
(org-entry-put (point) "TIME" (plist-get data :time)))
(when (plist-get data :availability)
(org-entry-put (point) "AVAILABILITY"
(replace-regexp-in-string "\n+"" "
(plist-get data :availability))))
(when (plist-get data :public)
(org-entry-put (point) "PUBLIC_CONTACT"
(replace-regexp-in-string "\n+"" "
(plist-get data :public))))
(when (plist-get data :private)
(org-entry-put (point) "EMERGENCY"
(replace-regexp-in-string "\n+"" "
(plist-get data :private))))
(when (plist-get data :q-and-a)
(org-entry-put (point) "Q_AND_A"
(replace-regexp-in-string "\n+"" "
(plist-get data :q-and-a))))
(save-excursion
(insert (plist-get data :body)))
(re-search-backward org-drawer-regexp)
(org-fold-hide-drawer-toggle 'off)
(org-end-of-meta-data)
(split-window-below)))
emacsconf-mail-parse-submission: Extract data from EmacsConf 2023 submissions in BODY.
(defunemacsconf-mail-parse-submission (body)
"Extract data from EmacsConf 2023 submissions in BODY."
(when (listp body) (setq body (plist-get (car body) :content)))
(let ((data (list :body body))
(fields '((:title"^[* ]*Talk title")
(:description"^[* ]*Talk description")
(:format"^[* ]*Format")
(:intro"^[* ]*Introduction for you and your talk")
(:name"^[* ]*Speaker name")
(:availability"^[* ]*Speaker availability")
(:q-and-a"^[* ]*Preferred Q&A approach")
(:public"^[* ]*Public contact information")
(:private"^[* ]*Private emergency contact information")
(:release"^[* ]*Please include this speaker release"))))
(with-temp-buffer
(insert body)
(goto-char (point-min))
;; Try to parse it
(while fields
;; skip the field title
(when (and (or (looking-at (cadar fields))
(re-search-forward (cadar fields) nil t))
(re-search-forward "\\(:[ \t\n]+\\|\n\n\\)" nil t))
;; get the text between this and the next field
(setq data (plist-put data (caar fields)
(buffer-substring (point)
(or
(when (and (cdr fields)
(re-search-forward (cadr (cadr fields)) nil t))
(goto-char (match-beginning 0))
(point))
(point-max))))))
(setq fields (cdr fields)))
(if (string-match "[0-9]+" (or (plist-get data :format) ""))
(plist-put data :time (match-string 0 (or (plist-get data :format) ""))))
data)))
The functions above are in the emacsconf-el repository. When I call
emacsconf-mail-parse-submission and give it the talk ID I want to
use, it makes the Org entry.
Figure 2: Creating the entry
We store structured data in Org Mode properties such as NAME,
EMAIL and EMERGENCY. I tend to make mistakes when typing, so I
have a short function that sets an Org property based on a region.
This is the code from my personal config:
my-org-set-property: In the current entry, set PROPERTY to VALUE.
(defunmy-org-set-property (property value)
"In the current entry, set PROPERTY to VALUE.Use the region if active."
(interactive (list (org-read-property-name)
(when (region-active-p) (replace-regexp-in-string "[ \n\t]+"" " (buffer-substring (point) (mark))))))
(org-set-property property value))
I've bound it to C-c C-x p. This is what it looks like when I use it:
Figure 3: Setting Org properties from the region
That helps me reduce errors in entering data. I sometimes forget
details, so I ask other people to double-check my work, especially
when it comes to speaker availability. That's how I copy the
submission e-mails into our Org file.
[2023-04-12 Wed]: Remove / from the beginning so that I can use
this in a function. Split book function into JSON and command. Updated effects to hide particles.
[2023-04-10 Mon]: Separated trident into channeling and riptide.
A+ likes playing recent Minecraft snapshots because of the new
features. The modding systems haven't been updated for the snaphots
yet, so we couldn't use mods like JourneyMap to teleport around. I
didn't want to be the keeper of coordinates and be in charge of
teleporting people to various places.
It turns out that you can make clickable books using JSON. I used the
Minecraft book editor to make a prototype book and figure out the
syntax. Then I used a command block to give it to myself in order to
work around the length limits on commands in chat. A+ loved being able
to carry around a book that could teleport her to either of us or to
specified places, change the time of day, clear the weather, and
change game mode. That also meant that I no longer had to type all the
commands to give her water breathing, night vision, or slow falling,
or give her whatever tools she forgot to pack before she headed out.
It was so handy, W- and I got our own copies too.
Manually creating the clickable targets was annoying, especially since
we wanted the book to have slightly different content depending on the
instance we were in. I wanted to be able to specify the contents using
Org Mode tables and generate the JSON for the book using Emacs.
Here's a screenshot:
Figure 1: Screenshot of command book
This is the code to make it:
(defunmy-minecraft-remove-markup (s)
(if (string-match "^[=~]\\(.+?\\)[=~]$" s)
(match-string 1 s)
s))
(defunmy-minecraft-book-json (title author book)
"Generate the JSON for TITLE AUTHOR BOOK.BOOK should be a list of lists of the form (text click-command color)."
(json-encode
`((pages .
,(apply 'vector
(mapcar
(lambda (page)
(json-encode
(apply 'vector
(seq-mapcat
(lambda (command)
(let ((text (my-minecraft-remove-markup (or (elt command 0) "")))
(click (my-minecraft-remove-markup (or (elt command 1) "")))
(color (or (elt command 2) "")))
(unless (or (string-match "^<.*>$" text)
(string-match "^<.*>$" click)
(string-match "^<.*>$" color))
(list
(append
(list (cons 'text text))
(unless (string= click "")
`((clickEvent
(action . "run_command")
(value . ,(concat "/" click)))))
(unless (string= color "")
(list (cons 'color
color))))
(if (string= color "")
'((text . "\n"))
'((text . "\n")
(color . "reset")))))))
page))))
(seq-partition book 14)
)))
(author . ,author)
(title . ,title))))
(defunmy-minecraft-book (title author book)
"Generate a command to put into a command block in order to get a book.Label it with TITLE and AUTHOR.BOOK should be a list of lists of the form (text click-command color).Copy the command text to the kill ring for pasting into a command block."
(let ((s (concat "item replace entity @p weapon.mainhand with written_book"
(my-minecraft-book-json title author book))))
(kill-new s)
s))
With this code, I can generate a simple book like this:
(my-minecraft-book "Simple book""sachac"'(("Daytime""set time 0800")
("Creative""gamemode creative""#0000cd")))
item replace entity @p weapon.mainhand with written_book{"pages":["[{\"text\":\"Daytime\",\"clickEvent\":{\"action\":\"run_command\",\"value\":\"/set time 0800\"}},{\"text\":\"\\n\"},{\"text\":\"Creative\",\"clickEvent\":{\"action\":\"run_command\",\"value\":\"/gamemode creative\"},\"color\":\"#0000cd\"},{\"text\":\"\\n\",\"color\":\"reset\"}]"],"author":"sachac","title":"Simple book"}
To place it in the world:
I changed my server.properties to set enable-command-block=true.
In the game, I used /gamemode creative to switch to creative mode.
I used /give @p minecraft:command_block to give myself a command block.
I right-clicked an empty place to set the block there.
I right-clicked on the command block and pasted in the command.
I added a button.
Then I clicked on the button and it replaced whatever I was holding
with the book. I used item replace instead of give so that it's
easy to replace old versions.
Now producing instance-specific books is just a matter of including
the sections I want, like a table that has coordinates for different
bases in that particular instance.
I thought about making an Org link type for click commands and some
way of exporting that will convert to JSON and keep the whitespace.
That way, I might be able to write longer notes and export them to
Minecraft book JSON for in-game references, such as notes on villager
blocks or potion ingredients. The table + Emacs Lisp approach is
already quite useful for quick shortcuts, though, and it was easy to
write. We'll see if we need more fanciness!
So I checked out emacs-cube, but I had a hard time figuring out how to
work with the data model without getting into all the rendering
because it figures "left" and "right" based on camera position.
rubik.el seemed like an easier starting point. As far as I can tell,
the rubik-cube-state local variable is an array with the faces
specified as 6 groups of 9 integers in this order: top, front, right,
back, left, bottom, with cells specified from left to right, top to
bottom.
First, I wanted to recolour rubik so that it matched the setup of
the Roofpig JS library I'm using for animations.
(defconstmy-cubing-rubik-faces"YRGOBW")
;; make it match roofpig's default setup with yellow on top and red in front
(defconstrubik-faces [rubik-yellow
rubik-red
rubik-green
rubik-orange
rubik-blue
rubik-white])
Here are some functions to apply an algorithm (or actually, the inverse of the algorithm, which is useful for exploring a PLL case):
(defunmy-cubing-normalize (alg)
"Remove parentheses and clean up spaces in ALG."
(string-trim
(replace-regexp-in-string "[() ]+"" " alg)))
(defunmy-cubing-reverse-alg (alg)
"Reverse the given ALG."
(mapconcat
(lambda (step)
(if (string-match "\\`\\([rludfsbRLUDFSBxyz]\\)\\(['i]\\)?\\'" step)
(concat (match-string 1 step)
(if (match-string 2 step)
"""'"))
step))
(reverse
(split-string (my-cubing-normalize alg) " "))
" "))
(defunmy-cubing-rubik-alg (alg)
"Apply the reversed ALG to a solved cube.Return the rubik.el cube state."
(let ((reversed (my-cubing-reverse-alg alg)))
(seq-reduce
(lambda (cube o)
(when (intern (format "rubik-%s"
(replace-regexp-in-string "'""i" o)))
(unless (string= o "")
(rubik-apply-transformation
cube
(symbol-value
(intern
(format "rubik-%s"
(replace-regexp-in-string "'""i" o)))))))
cube)
(split-string reversed " ")
(rubik-make-initial-cube))))
Then I got the strings specifying the side colours and the top colours
in the format that I needed for the SVG diagrams. I'm optimistically
using number-sequence here instead of hard-coding the numbers so
that I can figure out how to extend the idea for 4x4 someday.
(my-cubing-rubik-last-layer-with-sides-from-alg
"R U R' F' R U R' U' R' F R2 U' R' U'"'((1 7 t) (2 8 t)))
It's also nice to be able to interactively step through the algorithm.
I prefer a more compact view of the undo/redo state.
;; Override undo information
(defunrubik-display-undo ()
"Insert undo information at point."
(cl-loop with line-str = "\nUndo: "
for cmd in (reverse (cdr rubik-cube-undo))
for i = 1 then (1+ i)
do (progn
(setq line-str (concat line-str (format "%s " (get cmd 'name))))
(when (> (length line-str) fill-column)
(insert line-str)
(setq line-str (concat "\n" (make-string 6 ?\s)))))
finally (insert line-str)))
;; Override redo information
(defunrubik-display-redo ()
"Insert redo information at point."
(cl-loop with line-str = "\nRedo: "
for cmd in (cdr rubik-cube-redo)
for i = 1 then (1+ i)
do (progn
(setq line-str (concat line-str (format "%s " (get cmd 'name))))
(when (> (length line-str) fill-column)
(insert line-str)
(setq line-str (concat "\n" (make-string 6 ?\s)))))
finally (insert line-str)))
(defunmy-cubing-convert-alg-to-rubik-commands (alg)
(mapcar
(lambda (step)
(intern
(format "rubik-%s-command"
(replace-regexp-in-string "'""i" step))))
(split-string (my-cubing-normalize alg) " ")))
(rubik-define-commands
rubik-U "U" rubik-U2 "U2" rubik-Ui "U'"
rubik-F "F" rubik-F2 "F2" rubik-Fi "F'"
rubik-R "R" rubik-R2 "R2" rubik-Ri "R'"
rubik-L "L" rubik-L2 "L" rubik-Li "L'"
rubik-B "B" rubik-B2 "B" rubik-Bi "B'"
rubik-D "D" rubik-D2 "D" rubik-Di "D'"
rubik-x "x" rubik-x2 "x" rubik-xi "x'"
rubik-y "y" rubik-y2 "y" rubik-yi "y'"
rubik-z "z" rubik-z2 "z2" rubik-zi "z'")
(defunmy-cubing-rubik-set-to-alg (alg)
(interactive"MAlg: ")
(rubik)
(fit-window-to-buffer)
(setq rubik-cube-state (my-cubing-rubik-alg alg))
(setq rubik-cube-redo (append (list 'redo)
(my-cubing-convert-alg-to-rubik-commands
alg)))
(setq rubik-cube-undo '(undo))
(rubik-draw-all)
(display-buffer (current-buffer)))
And now I can combine all those pieces together in a custom Org link type that will allow me to interactively step through an algorithm if I open it within Emacs and that will export to a diagram and an animation.
Let's try that with this F-perm, which I haven't memorized yet:
[[3x3:(R' U' F')(R U R' U')(R' F R2 U')(R' U' R U)(R' U R)?arrows=1-7,7-1,2-8,8-2]]
At some point, I'd like to change the display for rubik.el so that it
uses SVGs. (Or the OpenGL hacks in https://github.com/Jimx-/emacs-gl,
but that might be beyond my current ability.) In the meantime, this
might be fun.
In rubik.el, M-r redoes a move and M-u undoes it. Here's what it looks like with my tweaked interface:
Figure 1: Animated GIF of rubik.el stepping through an F-perm
