Salut André,
I could but it's currently quite messy as there are portions of code that do
portions of things. I didn't get around unifying the whole thing and would like
to change some algorithms in one of the parts to be more efficient. Currently
it has 3 languages for 3 different things, one not compatible with the others
(swift). But if you know a bit of python and can follow instructions, I'm glad
to send you the scripts and write down what needs to go where.
Cheers,
On 3/04/2016, at 5:07 AM, Andre Polykanine <andre@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hello Yuma,
Would you open-source your transforming script or at least make it
available for the blind?
Thanks!
--
With best regards from Ukraine,
Andre
Skype: Francophile
Twitter: @m_elensule; Facebook: menelion
My blog: http://menelion.oire.org/
------------ Original message ------------
From: Yuma Decaux <jamyad7@xxxxxxxxx>
To: program-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date created: , 12:47:29 AM
Subject: [program-l] Re: How did you guys learn mathematics efficiently?
Hi,
As I said earlier, for the symbols, there are ways to go around them, but you
need to have a script that identifies a given \latex formula or utf-8/unicode
character then change it to a readable form. This is what my script does,
which has helped me a lot through my own courses and still do as my current
courses have the same issues, though now I don't fumble but just run the
script and verify all is good before reading the documents.
As a computeer scientist it is hard to have to deal with all of this but
again, being a computer scientists tadaa, you know how to write stuff and how
to manage complex data, so practicing that knowledge to allow you access to
the math equations is like solving puzzles to get to some ancient text to
decypher. You just get better at it the more hours you dedicate to making
something accessible. And when I mean accessible, it's not just that you can
read it. But read it efficiently.
I think some of us should take some time to allow for this universal math
access. Like I said, latex to simple text transformers, sound based 3D graph
readers and other helpers that make use of both computers and print, such as
connnecting a leap motion and reading a papers orientation than mapping the
image on the paper to the image counterpart in the software. etc etc.
Cheers,
On 1/04/2016, at 5:43 AM, Parham Doustdar <parham90@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi Yuma,
Your knowledge of math is extraordinary, inspiring and impressive. I, too,
wonder how you could learn so much. I personally am looking for a way to
approach math from the other end (i.e. as you said, learning the
abstractions and the concepts behind the visualizations) but am failing to
do so. For example, all the explanations on the web are unreadable both
because of the symbols (as you mentioned), but also because of a few
techniques that make math look good in HTML, but makes it unable to
understand when reading the text with a screen reader. For example, I have
found a lot of times that log(53) is actually not the logarithm of 53, but
the logarithm of 5, with 3 being the superscript.
I personally think that knowing what each function is used for, without
knowing how it works, will not suit my learning style. For something to
stick, i need to learn why things are the way they are. It's easy to do in
programming because I know all the concepts, but when it comes to machine
learning, I'm finding it to be a lot more difficult.
I have looked at beginner math e-books for computer programmers. However,
they, too, are focused too much on presentation and visualization rather
than talking about the concepts behind the graphs and such. So, I would love
to know how you managed to learn so much without messing around with this
kind of data.
Best of luck to you.
On 3/31/2016 8:33 PM, Yuma Decaux wrote:
Hi Paran,
It's no easy thing to do mathematics without having the visual help. But it
is possible. I'm currently taking 3rd year math courses which are just an
extension of the basics learned on years 1 and 2.
The trick is really to have a method to translate some of the unicode/utf-8
format into more ascii characters and settle your own semantic preferences.
When it comes to interpreting what a function would do in a graph, you need
to know and solder the basics in your head such as what kind of curve a
square or a cube would do x^2 x^3. Or what a logarithmic, exponential or
trig function would look like and what their mechanics are based on, what
you usually use them for in the abstract. But a good start is having a few
relief print papers for this.
But generally, visuals are only there to help you understand more. My
physics teacher told me that if you understand the abstraction, you won't
need the visuals so far as to confirm what you estimate. So generally you
will have to go beyond the cryptic language that puts off a lot of people,
even sighted people, from doing maths.
Say for instance a linear regression model used for gradient descent, a
technique in machine learning:
theta = theta - alfa* sigma(i=1, n): (x(i)*theta - y(i)*dy/dx
In the above, apart from obvious variables such as x y theta alpha, you
have more notations which are recurrent anywhere in maths such as sigma. It
can mean a lot of things but in this example or format, it will mean the
summation of terms for x and y with i starting at 1 and ending at n. dy/dx
represents a derivative. You also need to know what a derivative is, how it
is used for proportions, gradients to a function curve, and computation
using anti-derivatives for getting a value from two others.
This is problematic to decypher on current pdf and lecture formats so you
need to find a way to parse the text so that it ends up in a readable html
format. I have a parser that works both in java and swift if you want to
give it a go, as it can translate 80 of the most common math symbols into
something readable, from trig functions to sumations, derivatives,
fractions and number theory. I also have a graph reader that sonifies the
value of a graph at y with higher values having a higher pitch. But it's
not perfect as I do this in my free time, which I don't have much, for
optimising the interface.
Finally, it all depends on what you want to learn in ML, if you want just
to understand what the functions used for certain techniques are, I can
send you my course ware with the exercises and examples translated into
readable format. These are in matlab though, so that's another learning
curve to be aware of.
Cheers,
On 1/04/2016, at 12:47 AM, Parham Doustdar <parham90@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi,
I'm not finding any accessible way of learning mathematics online. I am
trying to learn machine learning, and I'm finding that I cannot understand
the math knowledge required for it, and when googling, I come up with
charts and formulae that cannot be read with screen readers.
I personally learn when the knowledge presented to me explains the 'why'.
For example, instead of just saying variance is calculated by deducting
the mean from each number in our data set, squaring the results, and then
getting an average, I would like to know why we are squaring the results
there. As a matter of fact, I spent about rhity minutes trying to figure
out the answer to this simple question on the net, and my answer was that
this is to prevent our results from canceling each other out, and to make
them give a much more exact number when the variance of our data is small.
Based on this method of learning, what resources do you recommend for
learning mathematics and statistics?
Thanks!
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