(tentative) intentions

Roadmap for the next months


My plan for the short-mid term for the blog is to provide a conceptual approach to graph transformation, keeping aside technicalities and concentrating mainly on the ideas, as proposed by Goldreich et al.

My (tentative) roadmap is the following: a few posts revisiting the history and background of MGG and related topics. I will comment on other approaches to graph dynamics. Then we will check the main concepts of MGG, "informally" so to speak: completion, coherence, initial digraphs, composition, matching, sequentialization, parallelism, restrictions (graph constraints and application conditions) and reachability. I will try to propose directions for further research if it seems to me that I have something sensible to say.

This will possibly amuse myself for several months. Later, or maybe in the meanwhile, I will touch on topics such as labelling, multigraphs and some others. More advanced topics will be also addressed. As we progress, we will be hopefully entering the realms of complexity theory.

From time to time I will insert non-related topics if I'm aware of something interesting in the world of mathematics. The main topic here is discrete mathematics but in principle I do not close the door to any interesting stuff.


Donald Knuth: The most important thing in the programming language is the name. A language will not succeed without a good name. I have recently invented a very good name and now I am looking for a suitable language.

MGG blog starts running!

Finally, I have decided to start this blog on Matrix Graph Grammars in blogger. Some of the entries were previously published in a blog that I maintained in my own server... but I gave up... this is easier, cheaper, ..., oh, dude.

I will try to maintain this blog entries as regularly as possible, but unfortunately this does not mean once per day or even once per week. My intention is to comment on what I'm currently investigating, mainly focused on matrix graph grammars, but it is possible that I might include other (un)related topics.

I'd like to include a quote in every post. The following one from Aristotle is illuminating: one swallow does not make a summer, nor does one day; and so too one day, or a short time, does not make a man blessed and happy.

Virginia Muñoz Calvo

Virginia Muñoz Calvo. In memoriam.

Este post lo publiqué en mi anterior blog el día 26.09.2008. I published this post in my previous blog on 26.09.2008.

En español (english free translation below).
 
Virginia Muñoz Calvo es mi abuela. Tras un cúmulo de enfermedades (entre las que se incluyen cáncer, alzheimer, un derrame cerebral y algunas otras) que la han tenido postrada en cama durante los últimos cuatro años, ha fallecido el pasado lunes 22.09.08 alrededor de las 19:30 de la tarde. Sea esta entrada un homenaje a su memoria.

Mi abuela ha sido una persona muy activa, emprendedora, con una singular capacidad para los negocios, profundamente religiosa pero, fundamentalmente, buena. Le tocó vivir una época muy complicada en España: una muy cruenta guerra civil y una postguerra llena de necesidades junto con una dictadura.

Su capacidad la llevó a fundar varias empresas en el sur de España (concretamente en Granada, relacionadas con el aceite, el cultivo y la ganadería) lo que permitió a la familia de mi madre disfrutar de una posición económica envidiable. Esto es especialmente meritorio en una época en la que la mujer estaba completamente sometida al hombre. De hecho, además de gestionar sus negocios, siempre se encargó de la educación de sus cuatro hijos.

Su profunda religiosidad siempre marcó su comportamiento: ayundándole en los momentos difíciles y aumentando su generosidad con los demás en los buenos. La recuerdo con un librito de oraciones completamente desgastado, un rosario y una Biblia que era capaz de recitar de memoria.

Yo soy su nieto mayor y eso me puso en una posición de privilegio. Siempre se portó muy bien conmigo y no tengo ni un solo recuerdo malo. Para mí ha sido una mujer admirable, avanzada a su época en muchos aspectos y producto de la misma en muchos otros, que sin duda ha sabido aprovechar el tiempo del que ha dispuesto.

D.E.P.

Simpre termino mis entradas con una frase o cita de alguien ilustre. Hoy he elegido una que usó su marido (mi abuelo) y que siempre me ha parecido especialmente afortunada: con la cuchara que cojas, comerás. En mi opinión, mi abuelo escogió una de las mejores. 

English free translation

Virginia Muñoz Calvo, my grandmother passed away on 22.09.08 at about 19:30. Last four years have been especially difficult and painfull for her due to a cancer, alzheimer, a brain hemorrhage and some other diseases. May this post honor her memory.

My grandmother has been a very active and enterprising person, very good at business, extremely religious but, overall, good person. Her lifetime was a particuarly difficult time in Spain's history: a bloody civil war and a postwar time in which almost everybody suffered hardships. Add Franco's dictatorship.

Her singular character led her to establish several companies in Granada (south of Spain) related to stockbreeding, olives and cultivation. My mother's family economical position was enviable at that time. This is particularly commendable when women were completely dependant on men (subjugated). Actually she was always in charge of the education of her four children.

Her profound religiosity always led her behaviour: helping in the bad times and being generous in the good times. I remember of her praying with a worn-out little prayer book, a a rosary and a Holy Bible that she knew by memory.

I am the eldest grandson, so I had a priviledged position. She was so good to me that I do not even have a single bad memory. An admirable woman, advanced to her time in many aspects as well as product of it in many others, that, no doubt, seized the time she had here.

R.I.P.

I always end citing someone famous or important. Today I choose a phrase that my grandfather used in the past and that I find particularly inspired: you will eat with the spoon you choose. In my opinion, my grandfather chose one of the bests.