Why Jonny Can't Code
-
Christian Graus wrote:
C# or VB, a beginner should write one class console apps at first, in my book.
Yes, but why should they have too? Wouldn't something more basic be a better zero-level? Remove even the concepts of classes and namespaces (and even datatypes) from the very early learning stages.
PIEBALDconsult wrote:
Remove even the concepts of classes and namespaces
That seems key. Of course all those are good practice, but to a beginner they just want to dive in without worrying about unnecessary details. Get them interested, then teach them how to write better code.
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
-
dighn wrote:
and do "Hello World" in minutes.
Not much beats: 10 Print "Hello World" run Marc
I'm not overthinking the problem, I just felt like I needed a small, unimportant, uninteresting rant! - Martin Hart Turner
Marc Clifton wrote:
Not much beats: 10 Print "Hello World" run
C:\>echo Hello Marc
no line numbers, no special characters, no run command, file is optional, ... :)
Luc Pattyn
I only read code that is properly indented, and rendered in a non-proportional font; hint: use PRE tags in forum messages
Local announcement (Antwerp region): Lange Wapper? Neen!
-
ahmed zahmed wrote:
Where's the BASIC of today.
Perl.
ahmed zahmed wrote:
Can you even get BASIC nowadays?
I have Turbo BASIC on 5.25" floppies. P.S. Also HP BASIC on my AlphaServers, but it's a shame that DEC abandoned the BASIC environment that I first learned on the high school's PDP-11. :sigh:
JB> type test.bas
10 A=5
20 B=4
30 C=A*B
40 PRINT C
50 END
JB> basic test.bas
JB> link test
JB> run test
20
JB>modified on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 8:46 PM
PIEBALDconsult wrote:
it's a shame that DEC abandoned the BASIC environment that I first learned on the high school's PDP-11
I could do a PDP-11 simulator for you. You would have to specify the specific model, as not all anomalies were documented well; I do recall "programs" copying themselves and running backwards on a PDP 11/45, something like MOV -(PC),-(PC) or whatever the exact syntax was. Do you still have an appropriate OS around, say RSX11M or D? :)
Luc Pattyn
I only read code that is properly indented, and rendered in a non-proportional font; hint: use PRE tags in forum messages
Local announcement (Antwerp region): Lange Wapper? Neen!
-
You should ALWAYS peek before you poke.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
If you're going to poke anyway, why bother peeking?
-
If you're going to poke anyway, why bother peeking?
I have to peek a little first in order to get excited enough for the poke to be effective.
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
-
Christian Graus wrote:
most people who have written bad code, tend to continue to write it that way
Aside from just learning the bad way of doing things, they need 2 more things:
- They need to be "burned" by the bad way.
- They need to be pointed to a better way.
If they have all 3 of those and they still don't learn, they are just plain stupid.
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
I prefer the more gentle way of teaching them as much as you can and then being there to catch them, without them ever knowing it's you that fucked them over. It's the Elven way. :)
-
Marc Clifton wrote:
Not much beats: 10 Print "Hello World" run
C:\>echo Hello Marc
no line numbers, no special characters, no run command, file is optional, ... :)
Luc Pattyn
I only read code that is properly indented, and rendered in a non-proportional font; hint: use PRE tags in forum messages
Local announcement (Antwerp region): Lange Wapper? Neen!
perl -e "print 'Hello, Luc!'
-
PIEBALDconsult wrote:
it's a shame that DEC abandoned the BASIC environment that I first learned on the high school's PDP-11
I could do a PDP-11 simulator for you. You would have to specify the specific model, as not all anomalies were documented well; I do recall "programs" copying themselves and running backwards on a PDP 11/45, something like MOV -(PC),-(PC) or whatever the exact syntax was. Do you still have an appropriate OS around, say RSX11M or D? :)
Luc Pattyn
I only read code that is properly indented, and rendered in a non-proportional font; hint: use PRE tags in forum messages
Local announcement (Antwerp region): Lange Wapper? Neen!
Luc Pattyn wrote:
PDP-11 simulator
Hell no! (It ran RSTS V7.0-07 anyway) One place I worked had an old PDP-11 sitting idle and my boss asked if I wanted it. I had no room and couldn't afford the electricity so I said no. I'm pleased with the AlphaServers I have, though a MicroVAX and an Itanium would make nice additions. P.S. Oh, I forgot to mention, from what I can tell, OpenVMS VAX does have the BASIC environment.
modified on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 11:37 PM
-
CaptainSeeSharp wrote:
Eugenicists don't deserve to have a good day.
ROTFL !!! How come you have started to pollute the lounge with this ignorant drivel ? I mean, I was happy to play with your retarded views in the back room, is that not enough for you anymore ?
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
Don't feed the trolls.
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes -
Luc Pattyn wrote:
PDP-11 simulator
Hell no! (It ran RSTS V7.0-07 anyway) One place I worked had an old PDP-11 sitting idle and my boss asked if I wanted it. I had no room and couldn't afford the electricity so I said no. I'm pleased with the AlphaServers I have, though a MicroVAX and an Itanium would make nice additions. P.S. Oh, I forgot to mention, from what I can tell, OpenVMS VAX does have the BASIC environment.
modified on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 11:37 PM
I studied Alpha in great detail long time ago (while selecting a RISC family for our own systems); never did a simulator for it, however I did a few other RISC ones. And I never used RSTS, in fact I completely forgot it ever existed. :)
Luc Pattyn
I only read code that is properly indented, and rendered in a non-proportional font; hint: use PRE tags in forum messages
Local announcement (Antwerp region): Lange Wapper? Neen!
-
I'm sorry. The article does appear stupid to me, but I did fly off a little bit. I'm just not having a good day. The point appears to me to be that languages with line numbers and no OO are a better starting point than any modern language. I don't really agree. You can create a simple VB.NET project and write plenty of VB code, without having line numbers, which are only useful for arbitrary goto statements, something I don't think people need to learn about.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
It seems to me that you can't teach "structured programming" unless you've introduced the class to its opposite. Regardless of language, have the student(s) try to implement something with just if and goto for flow control. X| Then introduce patterns, like for and while loops (with if/goto), then progress to real for and while loops. On the other hand, you have to know your audience. If the class just wants to be able to write some simple programs then by all means skip all that. As far as any students who intend to be serious developers, I believe that experiencing "the olde ways" is very important. It's why we had to learn a little Assembly, Fortran, and COBOL.
-
I prefer the more gentle way of teaching them as much as you can and then being there to catch them, without them ever knowing it's you that fucked them over. It's the Elven way. :)
When I opened the email that notified me of this message, the first line of text ended with "without them knowing it's you that f***ed them". During the fraction of a second it took me to find the next line of text, I was a little freaked out ;P
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
-
If the mountain doesn't come to you, don't waste your time running after it. When you meet the mountain, you are already a good developer.
how zen like...
-
Christian Graus wrote:
I've learned not to kill people
Better watch yourself, I'm still learning how to not kill people :menacing stare: And, actually, I'd say people who have killed probably better understand why one would not want to kill. Sure, you have a superficial understanding of it's wrong and would make you feel bad, but do you really know the depths to which you can really sink after you kill another human being? Would somebody who has killed before and regretted it be less likely to kill somebody who angered them, or would some guy who has never squashed a fly be less likely to kill somebody? Maybe killing is a bad example, because who says that's an ineffective means to achieve a goal (some may enjoy it and find it very useful)? Anyway, my bet is those who have experienced the downside of an experience (e.g., burning your hand on the stove) are less likely to make that mistake again. I certainly remember how complicated my Tony Hawk Pro Skater wiki was (written in QuickBasic with tons of goto statements) and wouldn't dare doing something like that in a program of any real complexity. But to a beginner, it might seem perfectly worthwile, even faster, than making "whole" functions "just" to control the flow of code.
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
Actually, I think the author must be stupid. First, it took me less then 30 seconds to find qbasic.com where you can download guess what: a BASIC interpreter. But beyond that, I never learned Basic. And most of the programmers I know never learned Basic. I don't think it has a place in modern computing. I would say go download the free .NET version of Visual Studio and pick either VB.NET or C#. I was driven from programming from the attitude that you learn by suffering through things like how to get your program into the computer. After one semester of COBOL, I wrote off what is a great profession for me. Eventually I figured out there was no need to suffer with the things that made me hate that class. I will never subject my kids to Basic. They can learn from a usable language. They can go through bad phases in a way that at least will transfer to something useful.
-
ahmed zahmed wrote:
Can you even get BASIC nowadays?
Maybe the next Code Project programming competition should be a BASIC interpreter, complete with a simple editor, syntax checker, and the ability to do cursor positioning in an 80x25 character grid, so basic (har har) character graphics could be done. Remember the good ol' "poke" statement? ;) Marc
I'm not overthinking the problem, I just felt like I needed a small, unimportant, uninteresting rant! - Martin Hart Turner
I wrote a nested for loop on the PET, poking all 255 values in every register. I found a tennis-court screen in 2 shades of green, and a backwards screen (text was big and screen was flipped 180).
"The activity of 'debugging', or removing bugs from a program, ends when people get tired of doing it, not when the bugs are removed." - "Datamation", January 15, 1984
-
ahmed zahmed wrote:
Can you even get BASIC nowadays?
Maybe the next Code Project programming competition should be a BASIC interpreter, complete with a simple editor, syntax checker, and the ability to do cursor positioning in an 80x25 character grid, so basic (har har) character graphics could be done. Remember the good ol' "poke" statement? ;) Marc
I'm not overthinking the problem, I just felt like I needed a small, unimportant, uninteresting rant! - Martin Hart Turner
You could even bring back Microsoft Clippy to help you code!
PlutoX
-
Why Jonny Can't Code[^] I think this guy's got a point. Things are very, maybe too complex for simple PRINT "Hello World!" type programs today. A lot of today's technologies are not very approachable... You don't start out mountain climbing by first tackling Mt. Everest. You start out much much smaller and work up to Mt. Everest. Where's the BASIC of today. Can you even get BASIC nowadays?
-
Wow - do you know anything about programming at all ? Visual Basic is, along with C#, one of the most popular languages for Windows development today. The writer is an idiot. He must be looking for a specific version of BASIC. The problem with programming today, is that there's so much drag and drop, point and click, write no code stuff going on that people are taking contract work and hitting a wall the moment they find they need to write code after all, and hitting our ASP.NET forums predominantly, although I notice a real increase in the WPF forum of late. The problem is that people assume it's easier than it really is to write good code, or just plain don't care about good code, and are glad that todays GC environments allow them to write crap that won't actually crash the system, and then sell it.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
"The problem with programming today, is that there's so much drag and drop, point and click, write no code stuff going on that people are taking contract work and hitting a wall the moment they find they need to write code after all" Amen to that. If I have to explain to one more stupid f**k how to loop through an collection, or or use a base page class I'm going to go gehad on their drag n' drop a**. 5 years ago I taught myself how to programm by reading books and tutorials online. I started with VB.NET and now do mostly C#. These days I make a good living building enterprise software. So I think .NET is a great place to start. I have tried several other languages and have not been impressed after working with .NET. I feel like nothing truly compairs. If I can become the developer for a software consulting company just by reading books and make the kind of money that good developers make with no colege degree, just by reading books. .NET is a great place to start. If you cant figure it out, maybe you are fresh out of college where they didn't teach you anything practical, or maybe this industry just isn't for you.
-Adam N. Thompson
-
I wrote a nested for loop on the PET, poking all 255 values in every register. I found a tennis-court screen in 2 shades of green, and a backwards screen (text was big and screen was flipped 180).
"The activity of 'debugging', or removing bugs from a program, ends when people get tired of doing it, not when the bugs are removed." - "Datamation", January 15, 1984
Richard Jones wrote:
I wrote a nested for loop on the PET, poking all 255 values in every register. I found a tennis-court screen in 2 shades of green, and a backwards screen (text was big and screen was flipped 180).
Hehe. That could be really dangerous, as you could affect the timing of the video chip and blow up the monitor! ;) Marc
I'm not overthinking the problem, I just felt like I needed a small, unimportant, uninteresting rant! - Martin Hart Turner
-
In my opinion the drag and drop, any mort can write code thing has really contributed to a lack of depth of knowledge. Often people I've hired or interviewed really know their framework and platform of choice really well but really don't understand how it works together and how the generated code works. So, when I have to hire contractors or consultants I come up with this as bit of a smoke test. I ask them to write me a Hello World app using their favorite language and framework. But, I have one condition, they can't use an IDE. I've found some really good people that way who are more efficient developers than I could ever hope to be. It doesn't really demonstrate a complete command of the inner workings but in my opinion it does show me that they aren't scared of diving into it if we need them to.
And above all things, never think that you're not good enough yourself. A man should never think that. My belief is that in life people will take you at your own reckoning. --Isaac Asimov Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
modified on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 9:22 PM