website VS css-turing-machine

Also check out https://pudding.cool if you’re unfamiliar and enjoy extremely high effort visualizations alongside editorial and educational text content.

Hello all, I am a JS beginner and I am passionate for creating data-driven stories on a website, like Pudding. I have watched some YT videos and learned that Python is a basic skill for dealing with data. However, I am confused about what Python does in such website? I know JS and it libraries like D3.js are used for front-end development and interactive data display, then what's the role of Python? For the website backend (such as Django)? Or is used for data cleaning and analysis? Or others? Or python is not actually required for making a data-driven story website?

https://pudding.cool/ ?

The main reason why I've got interested in frontend is that (1) it seems to be a field that can be much more diverse and collaborative across different fields (ex: working with designers) and (2) it directly interacts with users. Interactive journalism, data visualization, data storytelling (as in The New York Times or The Pudding) are my main interests currently, so it is more accurate to say I got interested in frontend with focus on those specific fields.

pudding.cool, statistical analysis of things like rap lyrics

> Technically html + css + user interaction can be turing complete: https://github.com/brandondong/css-turing-machine

Turing completeness is about what computations can be expressed, not what user interactions can be performed. The lambda calculus is Turing complete, but, if I whip up a lambda calculus interpreter and don't give it a print statement, then you'll never know anything about the computations it's performing.

Allow css in there and you get this

Seems like regex is not turing complete, bit its not a programming langauge ether. I thought i remembered that it was, i listed as one of the joke langauges as i know someome showed that PowerPoint is turing complete, but i think i mixed up regex and CSS here(that again is not a programming langauge but is in fact turing complete: https://github.com/brandondong/css-turing-machine)

It is definetly a borderline case (because of the need for clicking) , but html + css combined can be used to simulate the rule 110 automaton. Therefore it is possible to simulate a turing machine which means that it is in fact turing complete.

I understand CSS and I've done a fair bit of webdesign myself. CSS has evolved to the point where it can be used abusively. Hell some consider it turing complete (https://github.com/brandondong/css-turing-machine). From ads, to fingerprinting, to exploits there are valid reasons for wanting a little less functionality while still allowing for some basic styling. I mean, it's cool that there are computer games written in pure CSS and other neat tricks, but sometimes you just want a browser to behave itself even in hostile spaces. If that makes my locked down browser a "horse drawn cart" I'm happy to trot forward.

Yeah, someone even made a basic Turing machine to demonstrate it. As u/sext-scientist said, you have to click a button to perform each operation, but technically this means that you could write any program using HTML+CSS. Though the user might need an autoclicker to run even a "Hello World" program.