He talks about how he takes modern functional programing techniques from all walks, so not just monads, but reproducible builds (e.g. Nix, although Nix is not yet used), and building these very complex data processing pipelines. He talks about how at Cambridge he has to often sit down with scientists to discuss with them how they gather and process data and produce visualizations.
He then takes the code they have written, often in languages like R and Python, and translates the stateless, functional essence of it into OCaml, and then takes the references to the datasets (often hard-coded URLs) and turns them into proper data sources. The OCaml is annotated with symbols that allow for automatic generation of GUIs.
The data sources are incredibly diverse. Many of them come from scientific experiments that have been ongoing for decades, many of the sources come from multiple generations of measuring devices, where older devices give lower-accuracy information and newer sources give higher accuracy. He also talks about the importance of security for some data sources, e.g. the location of critically endangered animals that would almost certainly be poached if photographs of these animals leaked to the public, what with how easy it is to localize nowadays.
He also inspires computer scientists to use their talents to start talking with activists, and possibly even policy makers, directly to learn what their needs are and see how you can apply yout own skills.
WIlliam Byrd was in the audience and during the Q&A session informed the audience of a workshop related to this kind of intersection of technology and activism at the DECLMed workshop ("Declarative Programming for Biology and Medicine") colocated with ICFP2023, so please check that out as well.
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