Wind Knitting Factory

Knitting is programming. Read a knitting pattern and it's low level programming - knitters do not get enough credit.

Same with weaving, especially the way symmetry is weft in.

Jaccard looms are too general, too unconstrained. I like shaft looms more gratifying. Their restrictions make it more interesting.

By that logic any instructions is programming and everyone on earth are programmers.

Sources say God is actually a software engineer

I’m not sure that I’d say that it’s programming, but it is a pretty neat DSL

Instructions to machines probably are. Instructions to humans aren't because humans interpret things themselves and exercise free will in execution.

Written knitting instructions would benefit from a bit of standardisation and a system for depicting unusual stitches.

To an extent, yes (to the first part). For instance, the list of events scheduled for a performance is called a program.

Sure, why not?

Then I have to advertise the work of my father: https://oliviermasson.art/en/4-publications

Oh WOW.

It is from some summary of your dad's book that I had understood how shaft looms work.

Such beautiful weaves and such a small world. Happy meeting you here.

A reissue of your dad's book would be wonderful.

Maybe the closest match to the current thread:

Tempus Nectit Knitting Clock - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35882735 - May 2023 (10 comments)

Other related links (did I miss any?):

Consider Knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44143199 - May 2025 (143 comments)

Algebraic Semantics for Machine Knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43763614 - April 2025 (20 comments)

Vanishing Culture: Punch Card Knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43024540 - Feb 2025 (25 comments)

Semantics and scheduling for machine knitting compilers (2023) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40828754 - June 2024 (17 comments)

Unraveling the physics of knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40683130 - June 2024 (15 comments)

Show HN: Browser-based knitting (pattern) software - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40307089 - May 2024 (29 comments)

A WWII spy who hid codes in her knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35613247 - April 2023 (78 comments)

Using the Silver Reed SK840 Knitting Machine - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32897255 - Sept 2022 (19 comments)

Enabling Personal Computational Handweaving with a Low-Cost Jacquard Loom - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27423963 - June 2021 (6 comments)

Is Knitting Turing Complete? (2013) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25715534 - Jan 2021 (1 comment)

‘Knitting Is Coding’ and Yarn Is Programmable in This Physics Lab - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19950589 - May 2019 (62 comments)

Woven silk prayer book created with punch cards on Jacquard loom - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19252561 - Feb 2019 (1 comment)

Automatic Machine Knitting of 3D Meshes - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16536153 - March 2018 (36 comments)

Wartime Spies Who Used Knitting as an Espionage Tool - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14538038 - June 2017 (12 comments)

A Compiler for 3D Machine Knitting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12143482 - July 2016 (20 comments)

Nintendo Almost Made a Knitting Add-On for NES - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4472337 - Sept 2012 (22 comments)

Knitting as programming - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3986758 - May 2012 (12 comments)

Simulated Knitting in Python - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3329533 - Dec 2011 (7 comments)

Knitting is an Acceptable Lisp - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=484292 - Feb 2009 (6 comments)

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plus the related topic of Jacquard looms:

How an 1803 Jacquard Loom Led to Computer Technology [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41052908 - July 2024 (5 comments)

Manual on Jacquard Hand Loom Weaver (Frame Loom) (2007) [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23904850 - July 2020 (2 comments)

The Jacquard Loom: A Driver of the Industrial Revolution (2016) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18261993 - Oct 2018 (4 comments)

Jacquard Loom: Early Computer Programing (2011) [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9993953 - Aug 2015 (9 comments)

Jacquard Loom - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8479430 - Oct 2014 (15 comments)

Programming Jacquard's loom (1801) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=691175 - July 2009 (2 comments)

Thanks so much for killing my next couple of days :)

https://hn.algolia.com/?q=weaving

For some more. Not all are related to fabrics.

If you happen to be there and like this sort of thing, the lace museum in Calais is definitely worth a visit:

Cité de la Dentelle et de la Mode https://www.cite-dentelle.fr/en/

It's been about fifteen years since I visited, but they had a big section on the evolution of the techniques. It started from hand lace making, then progressed through periods of different looms. From memory, I'm pretty sure they had a punch-card loom about 200 years old, that was actually operating while I was there.