I am currently working on some 3D modeling software, and I want to export what I am doing in the simplest way possible. As I look at different options, I see, not surprisingly, that the simpler formats are less expressive, and the more complex formats are more expressive.
For example, if you just want to output a shape, everything is easy. But if you also want to be able to animate that shape, with joints that bend, then it gets more complicated.
None of this is surprising. But it gets me to wondering whether there is some sort of principle that could be written down mathematically, which expresses the tradeoff between simplicity and power.
For example, maybe there is a way to write each the two terms down as a number, and then multiply them. The basic idea would be that the result would be some constant, which would capture the idea of minimum “simplest possible yet expressive enough”.
In any case, it’s worth thinking about.