rupaka

rupaka (रूपक) means a form, a play that the audience sees, and the figure of speech that shows one thing through another. A rupaka demo is one interactive figure that teaches one idea. The learner changes the inputs and sees the result change.

A demo never shows the answer first. Each demo follows one loop:

1. Predict. The demo shows the inputs and asks one question. The result is hidden.
2. Reveal. The learner locks in with ⌘↩. The demo shows the result and says if the prediction was right.
3. Manipulate. Now the controls are live. The result changes when the inputs change.
4. Explain. The caption ends with a new question that the learner answers with the controls.

The validator enforces step 1: a block that shows a value which the answer depends on must wait for the gate.

What a demo is

A demo is a JSON spec, not code. It has a small state, derived values from named functions (fns), and a list of blocks. A model can write a spec safely, because a spec cannot run code.

The blocks are gate, readout, caption, row, stack, slider, toggle, choice, wheel, ranklist, bars, axis, point, plot and grid.

Install

pip install rupaka

The headless check needs playwright: pip install "rupaka[check]". It uses the Chromium that playwright install chromium gives, or the browser in $FASTCDP_CHROME. It never runs your everyday Chrome.

How to use

Build a spec with the builders, or write the JSON.

from rupaka.spec import *

d = demo('sum', 'A sum', ask='Predict the sum before you see it.', state=dict(a=2, b=3), derive=[expr('a + b', 'sum')],
         blocks=[gate('s', 'What is {a} + {b}?', [4, 5, 6], 'sum', why='Say why, in one line.'),
                 readout('{a} + {b} = {sum}', after='s')])

validate returns the errors. An empty list means the spec is good.

assert validate(d) == []

A readout that shows the sum before the gate breaks the think rule:

bad = {**d, 'blocks': [d['blocks'][0], readout('{a} + {b} = {sum}')]}
validate(bad)

Then put the demo where the learner is:

check(spec) draws the demo in headless Chrome and plays it. author(concept, ask) asks a model for a demo, and checks and repairs it.

The host API

A host page can read and change a demo that it mounted. In these calls, el is the element that holds the demo: the [data-rupaka] element, or the element that you gave to Rupaka.mount.

Rupaka.set, Rupaka.settle and Rupaka.open never send rk-predict, never add to st.log and never call save. Rupaka.options only reads. A lock does not stop Rupaka.set. Each call throws an error when no demo is mounted in el.

To show one demo in two windows, mount the spec in each window. Send Rupaka.state of the first copy to the second window, and call Rupaka.set there. To send a pick, send its index in Rupaka.options of the first copy. In the second window, find the value at that index in Rupaka.options, and call Rupaka.settle with it. When the learner in the first window clicks Try another, call Rupaka.open in the second window.

A host can remove the gate answers from the spec of a copy that a room sees, so that the room cannot read them early. Then give the answer to Rupaka.settle in answer. The gate uses it to draw the verdict. answer is {is: value} or a path in the state, as in a gate. When the spec has an answer, the gate uses the answer in the spec. Rupaka does not write answer into the spec or the state. When the spec has no answer and you give no answer, the gate closes with no verdict.

rupaka.poll makes a question for a room from a gate. of_gate(spec, gate) gives the question and the index of the answer. public(p) gives the part that the room sees.

The gallery

rupaka/demos/ holds hand-made demos: vowel sandhi, reciprocal rank fusion, softmax and temperature, nakṣatra and pāda, and a parabola.

Develop

The notebooks in nbs/ are the source of the Python. The JS and CSS are hand-written files under rupaka/static/, rupaka/blocks/ and rupaka/fns/.

uv sync
uv run nbdev-prepare
uv run pytest