There is already an open source K implementation called kona https://github.com/kevinlawler/kona , and now J is joining. There are old J source codes floating around, but the latest is from 1993 if I'm not mistaken.
Yes! I've been experimenting a LOT with kona.* K seems more my style, but I'm really excited about J being opened too! The APL family is way too interesting to have it confined by extremely expensive licenses and niche industries.
* Also, from communicating with the author: it's a clean re-implementation based on experience with it, not an open-sourced version of "real" K. (I've never used K or Q.)
I got the '93 J to work, too (on OpenBSD), but it's evolved a lot since then, and having the official version open will draw a lot more attention.
Also, thanks for answering some of my questions about J, K, and valence/rank a while back.
K is a lot more my style too: J has the kitchen sink. K provides closer to the "bare necessities". And yet, K programs are often shorter, simpler and more verbose.
Also, K operators often rhyme with the C meaning of the same characters: &=and/min, |=or/max, monadic*=first (like C dereference when applied to a vector; trenary?=[vector]choose. I think there are a few others.
I didn't know about Kona. Thank you thank you thank you! My transition from the sidelines into the pit of vector-oriented programming seems to be accelerating.
There is already an open source K implementation called kona https://github.com/kevinlawler/kona , and now J is joining. There are old J source codes floating around, but the latest is from 1993 if I'm not mistaken.