On 7/25/24 2:24 AM, D wrote:
> On Wed, 24 Jul 2024, The Real Bev wrote:
>> On 7/24/24 2:08 AM, D wrote:

>>> It is a shame, but when I walk the city streets and see the young with
>>> their faces in their smart phones, I am not surprised. You get all the
>>> evils as preinstalled little icons, and the good stuff requires a few
>>> hoops to jump through.
>>>
>>> But I do wonder if there will be a movement away from the corporate
>>> islands eventually?
>>
>> How would that work? The aforementioned young are too stupid to realize how
>> trapped they are and/or too ignorant to do anything about it if they DO
>> figure it out. The rest of us are just too damn tired :-(
>>
>
> A slow building up over time? Even if the majority is too stupid, perhaps
> there are a few who do see the light?
>
> Another way might be some big event or disaster, but given the reaction to
> cambridge analytic, and countless other privacy leaks and manipulation
> attemps, I do doubt it.
>
> When it comes to being tired, there comes a time in everyones lives when
> it is time to hand over to the next generation. You did your part, and
> that is fine, so you can rest content with that fact.

Rest, maybe, but not content. It's become way too easy to just say
"fuck it".

I've come to use Gemini rather than a real search -- SOOO much easier,
although you do have to subject the answers to a sanity check. But I
CAN search and read stuff. What about the kids who never learn to do
that because asking AI is so easy? Every once in a while I read where
some idiot says that people don't have to actually learn programming any
more because there are TOOLS...

What happens when there are no more toolmakers?

--
Cheers, Bev
======================================================================
Eat this, NSA: bomb assassinate Washington North Korea Iraq spy poison
ISIS AlQaeda Bush Clinton Pelosi Reid Obama Muslim Crusader explosion
Anthrax plutonium das bi Dania JD Salinger genius obama shithead akbar
72 revolution antifa Dave Foreman a god meet me in Berlin binary Iran
shoe underwear breakfast bitcoin dirty underground launch NSA soft kitty

The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>What happens when there are no more toolmakers?

Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)

On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>
> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)

I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
tools?

--
Cheers, Bev
"Don't you wish there were a knob on the TV to turn up the
intelligence? There's one marked "brightness", but it
doesn't work." -- Gallagher

The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> writes:
> On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>>What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
>> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
>> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
>> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
>> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
>> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)
>
> I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
> computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
> know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
> tools?

Obviously nobody. But it’s a hypothetical situation which isn’t about to
happen.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote:
> "Don't you wish there were a knob on the TV to turn up the
> intelligence? There's one marked "brightness", but it
> doesn't work." -- Gallagher
>

Uncle Miltie used this joke years before Gallagher was even born.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

In article <wwvfrrgrci1.fsf@LkoBDZeT.terraraq.uk>,
Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> writes:
>> On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
>>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>>>What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>>> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
>>> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
>>> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
>>> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
>>> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
>>> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)
>>
>> I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
>> computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
>> know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
>> tools?
>
>Obviously nobody. But it’s a hypothetical situation which isn’t about to
>happen.

Don't be sure. A CS professor I know told me this last week:

I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
counter.

Scary times. I'm glad I retire from software development in a few years.
--
Aharon (Arnold) Robbins arnold AT skeeve DOT com

On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:

> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>
> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that our
> PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
> counter.

“Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?

Aharon Robbins <arnold@skeeve.com> wrote:
>Don't be sure. A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>
> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
> counter.
>
>Scary times. I'm glad I retire from software development in a few years.

Isn't this in the "301" class in the ACM standard curriculum?
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>
>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>
>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that our
>> PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>> counter.
>
>“Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?

Turing.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>
>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>
>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that our
>> PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>> counter.
>
> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?

It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction being
executed.

Effectively, CPU's operate like this loop here

int pc=0;
while (1) {
execute_instruction (pc);
pc++;
}

After that, 'execute_instruction' can be thought of as a big conditional
statement that actually performs the task -- moving data between CPU
registers, reading from RAM, whatever.

--
|_|O|_|
|_|_|O| Github: https://github.com/dpurgert
|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

On Thu, 8 Aug 2024, Dan Purgert wrote:

> On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>
>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>
>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that our
>>> PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>>> counter.
>>
>> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>
> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction being
> executed.
>
> Effectively, CPU's operate like this loop here
>
> int pc=0;
> while (1) {
> execute_instruction (pc);
> pc++;
> }
>
> After that, 'execute_instruction' can be thought of as a big conditional
> statement that actually performs the task -- moving data between CPU
> registers, reading from RAM, whatever.
>
>

Could it have been called instruction counter on some platforms? My memory
is very hazy but I vaguely remember a register you could manipulate
directly from my assembler labs and the long gone days when I thought
computer viruses were interesting.

D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
> [-- text/plain, encoding 8bit, charset: UTF-8, 36 lines --]
>
>
>
> On Thu, 8 Aug 2024, Dan Purgert wrote:
>
>> On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>>
>>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>>
>>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me
>>>> that our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a
>>>> program counter.
>>>
>>> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>>
>> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction
>> being executed.
>>
>> Effectively, CPU's operate like this loop here
>>
>> int pc=0;
>> while (1) {
>> execute_instruction (pc);
>> pc++;
>> }
>>
>> After that, 'execute_instruction' can be thought of as a big
>> conditional statement that actually performs the task -- moving data
>> between CPU registers, reading from RAM, whatever.
>
> Could it have been called instruction counter on some platforms? My
> memory is very hazy but I vaguely remember a register you could
> manipulate directly from my assembler labs and the long gone days
> when I thought computer viruses were interesting.

Some architectures named it "program counter", others used the name
"instruction pointer", still others likely used "instruction counter".
If one searched through much of computer architecture history I'd say
one could find a least a half dozen names for it (used by different
architectures) if not more.

On Thu, 08 Aug 2024 22:24:30 +0200, D wrote:

>> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction being
>> executed.
>>
>> Effectively, CPU's operate like this loop here
>>
>> int pc=0; while (1) {
>> execute_instruction (pc);
>> pc++;
>> }
>>
>> After that, 'execute_instruction' can be thought of as a big
>> conditional statement that actually performs the task -- moving data
>> between CPU registers, reading from RAM, whatever.
>>
>>
>>
> Could it have been called instruction counter on some platforms? My
> memory is very hazy but I vaguely remember a register you could
> manipulate directly from my assembler labs and the long gone days when I
> thought computer viruses were interesting.

Instruction counter, to me, is something different. On the ICL 2900, it
literally counts the number of instructions executed. It can be used
instead of (or as well as) an interval timer, for scheduling.

The NCR/Elliott 4100 machines called the PC the S register (for Sequence
register).

--
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
http://www.mirrorservice.org

On 8 Aug 2024 09:21:29 -0000, Scott Dorsey wrote:

> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>
>>On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>
>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>
>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
>>> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>>> counter.
>>
>>“Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>
> Turing.

The Turing Machine never had a “program counter”.

On Thu, 8 Aug 2024 09:33:10 -0000 (UTC), Dan Purgert wrote:

> On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>
>> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>
>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>
>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
>>> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>>> counter.
>>
>> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>
> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction being
> executed.

Like I said, it’s a von Neumann thing.

On 2024-08-08, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On Thu, 8 Aug 2024 09:33:10 -0000 (UTC), Dan Purgert wrote:
>
>> On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>
>>> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>>
>>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>>
>>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
>>>> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>>>> counter.
>>>
>>> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>>
>> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction being
>> executed.
>
> Like I said, it’s a von Neumann thing.

Pretty sure my AVR Microcontrollers are Harvard Architecture, and they
certainly use a program counter...

--
|_|O|_|
|_|_|O| Github: https://github.com/dpurgert
|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

On Fri, 9 Aug 2024 01:14:18 -0000 (UTC), Dan Purgert wrote:

> Pretty sure my AVR Microcontrollers are Harvard Architecture ...

Come back to us when you have something from Yale.

On Thu, 8 Aug 2024, Rich wrote:

> D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>> [-- text/plain, encoding 8bit, charset: UTF-8, 36 lines --]
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, 8 Aug 2024, Dan Purgert wrote:
>>
>>> On 2024-08-07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>>> On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me
>>>>> that our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a
>>>>> program counter.
>>>>
>>>> “Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>>>
>>> It's the thing that holds the address of the current instruction
>>> being executed.
>>>
>>> Effectively, CPU's operate like this loop here
>>>
>>> int pc=0;
>>> while (1) {
>>> execute_instruction (pc);
>>> pc++;
>>> }
>>>
>>> After that, 'execute_instruction' can be thought of as a big
>>> conditional statement that actually performs the task -- moving data
>>> between CPU registers, reading from RAM, whatever.
>>
>> Could it have been called instruction counter on some platforms? My
>> memory is very hazy but I vaguely remember a register you could
>> manipulate directly from my assembler labs and the long gone days
>> when I thought computer viruses were interesting.
>
> Some architectures named it "program counter", others used the name
> "instruction pointer", still others likely used "instruction counter".
> If one searched through much of computer architecture history I'd say
> one could find a least a half dozen names for it (used by different
> architectures) if not more.
>

Ahh.. so maybe my memory did come up with something then! =) Thank you for
the clarification.

On 8/7/24 12:57 AM, Richard Kettlewell wrote:
> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> writes:
>> On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
>>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>>>What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>>> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
>>> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
>>> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
>>> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
>>> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
>>> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)
>>
>> I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
>> computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
>> know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
>> tools?
>
> Obviously nobody. But it’s a hypothetical situation which isn’t about to
> happen.

I'm not so sure. I look at the general dumbing down of our (and
apparently non-USA) population and wonder if there are enough
intelligent people left to make a difference. Look at the schools. Loot
at the governments. Look at the media. Is there any reason to be
optimistic?

--
Cheers, Bev
"We've got some stupid people out there. This morning, I woke
up in a bathtub filled with ice and I had an extra kidney."

On Fri, 9 Aug 2024, The Real Bev wrote:

> On 8/7/24 12:57 AM, Richard Kettlewell wrote:
>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> writes:
>>> On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
>>>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>>>> What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>>>> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
>>>> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
>>>> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
>>>> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
>>>> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
>>>> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)
>>>
>>> I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
>>> computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
>>> know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
>>> tools?
>>
>> Obviously nobody. But it’s a hypothetical situation which isn’t about to
>> happen.
>
> I'm not so sure. I look at the general dumbing down of our (and apparently
> non-USA) population and wonder if there are enough intelligent people left to
> make a difference. Look at the schools. Loot at the governments. Look at the
> media. Is there any reason to be optimistic?
>

In my case... short term no, long term, yes. We've survived, as a species,
world wars, famines, pestilence. Anything we're seeing today is nothing in
comparison.

Yes, we're perhaps at a local minimum, but give it a decade or two, and
we'll again sprint for a local maximum. =)

In article <v93ln7$b31t$6@dont-email.me>,
Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>On 8 Aug 2024 09:21:29 -0000, Scott Dorsey wrote:
>
>> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>>On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>>
>>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>>
>>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
>>>> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a program
>>>> counter.
>>>
>>>“Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>>
>> Turing.
>
>The Turing Machine never had a “program counter”.

It's the tape position.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On 9 Aug 2024 20:54:17 -0000, Scott Dorsey wrote:

> In article <v93ln7$b31t$6@dont-email.me>, Lawrence D'Oliveiro
> <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>On 8 Aug 2024 09:21:29 -0000, Scott Dorsey wrote:
>>
>>> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>>
>>>>On 07 Aug 2024 15:04:21 GMT, Aharon Robbins wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> A CS professor I know told me this last week:
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm one of the very few that teach Systems. It amazes me that
>>>>> our PhD students almost all in AI have never heard of a
>>>>> program counter.
>>>>
>>>>“Program counter” ... is that a von Neumann thing?
>>>
>>> Turing.
>>
>>The Turing Machine never had a “program counter”.
>
> It's the tape position.

It doesn’t “count” anything. That’s a von Neumann thing.

On 8/9/24 1:28 PM, D wrote:
>
>
> On Fri, 9 Aug 2024, The Real Bev wrote:
>
>> On 8/7/24 12:57 AM, Richard Kettlewell wrote:
>>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> writes:
>>>> On 8/6/24 6:55 AM, Stefan Ram wrote:
>>>>> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote or quoted:
>>>>>> What happens when there are no more toolmakers?
>>>>> Well, if by "toolmakers" you mean those devs cranking out text
>>>>> editors, search engines, or AI chatbots: We're swimming in them these
>>>>> days, more than ever before in human history! So I'd say: I'll cross
>>>>> that bridge when I come to it, if we ever actually run low on those
>>>>> folks. (Sure, some tech fields are hurting for talent, but that's
>>>>> probably not because of the new AI chatbots hitting the scene.)
>>>>
>>>> I mean people who have serious work to do and know how to make a
>>>> computer do it for them. REAL experts. If there are only people who
>>>> know how to use the tools already provided for them, who will make NEW
>>>> tools?
>>>
>>> Obviously nobody. But it’s a hypothetical situation which isn’t about to
>>> happen.
>>
>> I'm not so sure. I look at the general dumbing down of our (and apparently
>> non-USA) population and wonder if there are enough intelligent people left to
>> make a difference. Look at the schools. Loot at the governments. Look at the
>> media. Is there any reason to be optimistic?
>>
>
> In my case... short term no, long term, yes. We've survived, as a species,
> world wars, famines, pestilence. Anything we're seeing today is nothing in
> comparison.

We've never had as many people on earth as we have today, and there will
be more. At least in cities the big problem is just too many people,
most of them pretty stupid.

Still, I have to believe that smarter/cooler heads will prevail. Knock
wood...

> Yes, we're perhaps at a local minimum, but give it a decade or two, and
> we'll again sprint for a local maximum. =)

I don't see a mechanism...

--
Cheers, Bev
"Tell someone you love them today, because life is short.
But scream it at them in Klingon, because life is also
terrifying and confusing." -- D. Moore

Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> wrote:
> Web forums keep annoying me more and more with bloated interfaces,
> so I'm using them less and less, yet there's less and less to read
> on Usenet too. So lately I've been considering, not entirely
> seriously, writing a program to scrape specific web forums and
> generate a news spool with the content of the forum's latest posts
> for me to read (either locally, or perhaps remotely via NNTP).
>
> Has anyone done this before? I know there are various web forum
> platforms that support NNTP server-side, but I'm talking about web
> forums hosted by other people who I have no association or
> influence with. Has anyone done something that's purely a
> client-side implementation?

There's a mobile app called Tapatalk, which hooks into a number of web
forums to make them mobile friendly, including posting. I think they have
plugins for various platforms like phpBB, which forum operators can install
to get access to their forum from mobiles. If you see postings on a forum
that include text like 'Sent from my Samsung SM-GT9711QB via Tapatalk' then
that forum is Tapatalk enabled (or was at the time of posting).

It's been a decade or more since I looked at it, but thinking was that it
might be possible to hook into the Tapatalk interface and get some kind of
access to the raw forum database, rather than scraping the forum's web page.

Tapatalk still seems to be a thing, but use of phpBB and similar forums has
declined. Maybe they have plugins for Discourse and friends now?

Anyway, it might be worth digging into the Tapatalk protocol and seeing if
there's a way to hook into it from outside the Tapatalk ecosystem. I have
no idea if it's possible.

Theo

Theo <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
> Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> wrote:
>> Web forums keep annoying me more and more with bloated interfaces,
>> so I'm using them less and less, yet there's less and less to read
>> on Usenet too. So lately I've been considering, not entirely
>> seriously, writing a program to scrape specific web forums and
>> generate a news spool with the content of the forum's latest posts
>> for me to read (either locally, or perhaps remotely via NNTP).
>>
>> Has anyone done this before? I know there are various web forum
>> platforms that support NNTP server-side, but I'm talking about web
>> forums hosted by other people who I have no association or
>> influence with. Has anyone done something that's purely a
>> client-side implementation?
>
> There's a mobile app called Tapatalk, which hooks into a number of web
> forums to make them mobile friendly, including posting. I think they have
> plugins for various platforms like phpBB, which forum operators can install
> to get access to their forum from mobiles. If you see postings on a forum
> that include text like 'Sent from my Samsung SM-GT9711QB via Tapatalk' then
> that forum is Tapatalk enabled (or was at the time of posting).

Interesting, though I don't think I've ever seen reference to it on any
forum I view regularly so they probably don't have the Tapatalk plug-in
installed.

> It's been a decade or more since I looked at it, but thinking was that it
> might be possible to hook into the Tapatalk interface and get some kind of
> access to the raw forum database, rather than scraping the forum's web page.
>
> Tapatalk still seems to be a thing, but use of phpBB and similar forums has
> declined. Maybe they have plugins for Discourse and friends now?
>
> Anyway, it might be worth digging into the Tapatalk protocol and seeing if
> there's a way to hook into it from outside the Tapatalk ecosystem. I have
> no idea if it's possible.

Looks like it's possible, this PHP lib. has an extensive set of
functions:
https://github.com/netzmacht/tapatalk-client-api

Tapatalk don't support Discourse, but do support the other common
forum platforms I was looking at. It might be interesting if I get
keen enough to set up a Gmane-style news server where other people
can submit forums to be added, but for my own use it doesn't look
like it's installed on the forums I want to watch.

Thanks for the tip though.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#