tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17607237.post4504756821603069471..comments2024-03-18T00:46:28.369-07:00Comments on Quantum Chaotic Thoughts: Open-Source MathematicsMasonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04415369043595429843noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17607237.post-2573811162869174282009-10-13T19:32:57.685-07:002009-10-13T19:32:57.685-07:00With any luck, Google Wave is going to be an ideal...With any luck, Google Wave is going to be an ideal place to hold this sort of collaboration in the future. The preview is clunky but promising so far, and there's lots of work being done to integrate LaTeX, symbolic manipulation packages, bibliographic helpers, etc.Lemminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00071045128030421032noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17607237.post-29071522627406353612009-10-02T16:01:48.686-07:002009-10-02T16:01:48.686-07:00Gowers said that that number was 6-8, but it's...Gowers said that that number was 6-8, but it's certainly far from a true grassroots effort. In many ways, what has been accomplished is similar to the discussions I have with my collaborators and students on the private part of netwiki (the networks wiki I help Peter Mucha maintain). Nevertheless, this is a step in the right direction.<br /><br />Ernie Croot seems to be an active participant on the current polymath blog, and he and Terry Tao seem like people who could really help in such directions.Masonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04415369043595429843noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17607237.post-91781335799557148472009-10-02T15:05:51.634-07:002009-10-02T15:05:51.634-07:00I heard one of the other main collaborators, Ryan ...I heard one of the other main collaborators, Ryan O'Donnell, give a talk on this at Microsoft Research New England and came away feeling like it's a great idea but that in the end 95% of the work was done by maybe 4 or so people. Maybe O'Donnell, Gowers, Tao, and a few others. I guess most open-source software projects end up the same. In the polymath case it seemed the number of posts grew so quickly that if one ever fell behind then it would impossible to catch up. <br /><br />At the end the consensus among the audience and speaker seemed to be that future projects need to be better organized so that people who wander in and out can still contribute. One possibility mentioned was a Wiki summarizing hypotheses and conclusions, where one can look at the history and/or discussion to see the development of each aspect, without having to sort through a huge jumble of posts. I haven't looked at the new Polymath site, but hopefully they've structured things in such a way that it'll be easier for people to make small contributions without spending days trying to read a horde of posts just to get up to speed.Kuroyamahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05613785873616723639noreply@blogger.com