The difference between live coding and traditional programming is funny. essentially they are both the same, predefined functions, known variables and different ways of variable manipulation that changes how things are from input to output. The difference stems however in how manupilatable this output is and a chance to completely change the output of a function based in one keyboard symbol to get a string of completely different outputs that were not exactly planned by the function creator is even more interesting.

“Rejected the use of prewritten code and structures” in favor of “acting in the moment, responding to context… developing a structure as we work, continually creating and resolving tension”

ALGOBABEZ (Shelly Knotts and Joanne Armitag)

Live coding brings the definition of expected/planned output to a different form of adapting to the user response. Not a coded reaction, not an expected reaction, but a way of letting a human determine the next course of action in a way that combines the viewer’s reaction with the artist’s to create an instant change that combines both together. It’s like the authors said,

Yet, for all that computing neglects— those bodies hunched over keyboards and mice, at their desk- and- chair sets in the offices of the world— the live coding performer is unavoidably embodied (“made flesh”)

Live coding brings the person manipulating the code to life in a way traditional coding does not.

Something else that also stood out to me in this chapter is comparing the live coding to a performance. If we think about dance, then all traditionally dancing is the same as traditional programming, but maybe more contemporary, like an unpracticed dance performance, a free dance performance with code. The dancers know the dances, the programmers know the code, but neither know the trajectory of the performance

liveness as a connecting principle for exploring the relation between live coding (performing with programming languages) and live art (performing with actions).