Just published : BASIC on Commodore book
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I can't believe that APress just published (Dec. 2018) this book. Amazon.com: Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing: Learn BASIC with a Commodore Emulator eBook: Gerald Friedland: Kindle Store[^]
Author says:
True story. I was looking for a system that would help 7-year olds teach themselves programming. Hey it's 2018, right? After looking through what's available, the two major issues that I have with the current tools are: 1) Many of them require the Internet (too dangerous for self learning) 2) most, if not all, of them are drag and drop. I wanted a non-distracting environment where the kids practice reading and writing while learning to program. The sensation of causing an action simply by typing a word is priceless.
I don't know. Maybe just use JavaScript in a browser to teach. It's much more relevant and has far fewer barriers to entry. I mean I would've really liked this book back in 1990 or before, but not sure this one will have a market.
I saved some IBM punch cards for my kids. Need to work up a card reader and CPU.
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I saved some IBM punch cards for my kids. Need to work up a card reader and CPU.
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BryanFazekas wrote:
By using a basic language (pun intended) the student is focused on program logic and producing an expected result. That is the essence of programming -- not what looks pretty on the screen.
Agree 100%. That's part of the problem with the way most programming is taught now : they jump right into the complexities of UI etc which is meaningless until you really understand what you are doing. And, yes, OOP should be taught later since it is only a way to organize your code. When you first start writing code you just want to see it do something. This makes me think of the K&R C book. It's just a bunch of scripts really. They go through and show you how to do some simple things and since there was no GUI they concentrated on simple procedural programming. It was a simpler and more difficult time all together. You could do the simple quite easily but the complex was quite a bit harder to pull off due to memory and CPU limits.
I have K&C on my bookshelf -- I doubt I've touched it in 20+ years, which is how long since I've done C. I need to pull it off the shelf and leaf through it ...
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Likewise: I remember the fun I had using overlays - read from the cassette tape - because there wasn't enough space in that 8K.
I recall us discussing in class how the tape storage worked. Our math teacher was our budding CS teacher, and he had only slightly more of a clue than the students did. I'm not dinging the guy -- he was a great teacher, possibly the best I've ever had -- but this illustrates the early days of teaching CS in high schools.
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I saved some IBM punch cards for my kids. Need to work up a card reader and CPU.
Bruce Patin wrote:
I saved some IBM punch cards for my kids.
I did punch cards my freshman year, then the school converted to terminals. At the end of the first semester I recall seeing an upper classman carrying a large deck (probably 300+ cards) to drop off at the computer center. At that time we wrapped our deck with a couple of sturdy rubber bands and dropped them in a slot. At the beginning of the semester we could return in 1-2 hours to get our deck + printout. At the end of the semester it was 12 hours. This enforced reviewing the code and NOT making mistakes. Anyway, the upper classman dropped his deck and the single rubber band he used broke. Cards scattered all down the hallway. He looked like he was going to cry, started to pick up his card, then turned and walked away. The morals of this story? 1) use more than 1 rubber band. 2) use a wide marker to draw a diagonal stripe across the top of the deck to the cards can be re-ordered visually.
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This idea is actually brilliant. Read on for an explanation ... It was mentioned previously that programming is not for the masses -- very true -- it's a distinct skill set enjoyed by a small minority of the population. When politicians talk about programming for all kids, the concept is ridiculous. But most ideas from politicians are (doesn't matter where, they're peas in a pod). However, giving all children a chance to program enables the ones that will succeed to get that taste. Remove the expectation that all children should program -- presenting programming to all is a good idea. The ones that fit our mold will continue, the others will drop off and follow their own path. JavaScript? I can't think of a better way to drive a child away from programming that JavaScript. Unless it's Java. Or C#. Or pretty much any modern language. Ignoring the ridiculous complexity of "modern" languages and tools, if given visual tools children will focus on the visual aspects -- worry about the minutia of screen placement and appearance, not logic. By using a basic language (pun intended) the student is focused on program logic and producing an expected result. That is the essence of programming -- not what looks pretty on the screen. Teaching the children to think procedurally at first gets them into problem solving in a straightforward way. Teaching OO later on provides a more diverse skill set and opens their mind to the idea that multiple methodologies exist and each has its own place. Yeah, this idea is brilliant.
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Yeah, those are good points. Every web browser is almost like it's own OS. But you could even set out the rule that the reader could use FireFox, Chrome or Edge and then say, "ok, hit F12" (dev tools) type: 2+2 Works in all 3 of those browsers. After that, there's a lot you could teach directly from the console. I think a lot of books that try to teach JavaScript do overwhelm with all the node.js, extra libraries (even jQuery) stuff. If you're learning JavaScript you should learn the good old fashioned way. document.getElementByID(), etc. :)
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The problem with that approach is, can you really make a "complete program" you can package and share with someone and use elsewhere ? You could with the author's original approach. How would that work with a browser? That would be clumsy at best.
dandy72 wrote:
he problem with that approach is, can you really make a "complete program" you can package and share with someone and use elsewhere ?
I think so. I think it is even easier actually if you think about SPA (single page apps). Here's some very basic and (possibly) interesting JavaScript I created to create a very small "game". You can see it in your browser right now (without all the deployment challenges you'd have with Commodore BASIC) at : Robot Dots - HTML5 / JavaScript sample[^] The code to do that is only 271 lines long. You can read the article that explains the code (and see an animated gif of it in action)at: HTML5 Canvas : Clean JavaScript & Code Organization Allows Faster Dev, Easier Extensibility[^] I'm not saying that is a completely introductory article -- because there are some slightly advanced topics -- but I think you could get the interested party there very quickly. And, yes, JavaScript is limited in many ways (cannot write to file system, etc) but again I'm saying it is a nice language for getting new devs interested -- not as the final long-term goal. And if they are going to learn it as the long-term goal there are lot of caveats.
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I can't believe that APress just published (Dec. 2018) this book. Amazon.com: Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing: Learn BASIC with a Commodore Emulator eBook: Gerald Friedland: Kindle Store[^]
Author says:
True story. I was looking for a system that would help 7-year olds teach themselves programming. Hey it's 2018, right? After looking through what's available, the two major issues that I have with the current tools are: 1) Many of them require the Internet (too dangerous for self learning) 2) most, if not all, of them are drag and drop. I wanted a non-distracting environment where the kids practice reading and writing while learning to program. The sensation of causing an action simply by typing a word is priceless.
I don't know. Maybe just use JavaScript in a browser to teach. It's much more relevant and has far fewer barriers to entry. I mean I would've really liked this book back in 1990 or before, but not sure this one will have a market.
Javascript to teach an 8 year old programming? You just got to be kidding!
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Javascript to teach an 8 year old programming? You just got to be kidding!
Bitbeisser wrote:
Javascript to teach an 8 year old programming? You just got to be kidding!
I think you're coming with a lot of preconceived ideas. JavaScript can be simple. It can be. The fact that it isn't is due to the way some devs implement JavaScript. Is there anything tough about showing an 8 year old how to create a variable in JavaScript?
var counter = 0;
Also, most likely if the kid has any kind of computer (iOS, Windows, Linux) then she'll have everything she needs to begin (text editor, web browser). Here's the first program from old K&R C :
#include
main()
{
printf("hello, world\n");
}Here it is in JavaScript:
console.log("hello, world\n");
:) Now, advanced JavaScript, that's another thing altogether isn't it? Devs do some terrible things (bad code organization and using globals, etc) with JavaScript but it doesn't have to be that way if the teacher guides the student properly through the material.
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I can't believe that APress just published (Dec. 2018) this book. Amazon.com: Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing: Learn BASIC with a Commodore Emulator eBook: Gerald Friedland: Kindle Store[^]
Author says:
True story. I was looking for a system that would help 7-year olds teach themselves programming. Hey it's 2018, right? After looking through what's available, the two major issues that I have with the current tools are: 1) Many of them require the Internet (too dangerous for self learning) 2) most, if not all, of them are drag and drop. I wanted a non-distracting environment where the kids practice reading and writing while learning to program. The sensation of causing an action simply by typing a word is priceless.
I don't know. Maybe just use JavaScript in a browser to teach. It's much more relevant and has far fewer barriers to entry. I mean I would've really liked this book back in 1990 or before, but not sure this one will have a market.
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I can't believe that APress just published (Dec. 2018) this book. Amazon.com: Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing: Learn BASIC with a Commodore Emulator eBook: Gerald Friedland: Kindle Store[^]
Author says:
True story. I was looking for a system that would help 7-year olds teach themselves programming. Hey it's 2018, right? After looking through what's available, the two major issues that I have with the current tools are: 1) Many of them require the Internet (too dangerous for self learning) 2) most, if not all, of them are drag and drop. I wanted a non-distracting environment where the kids practice reading and writing while learning to program. The sensation of causing an action simply by typing a word is priceless.
I don't know. Maybe just use JavaScript in a browser to teach. It's much more relevant and has far fewer barriers to entry. I mean I would've really liked this book back in 1990 or before, but not sure this one will have a market.
Try again, my friend. JavaScript, as its namesake stands for is just a Scripting language akin to BASH and PowerShell. Yep, you can make it do great things, but with way too many caveats beginner wise. On the other hand, early 80s systems were complete development environments which presented themselves with no introduction and no serious booting (you can even run a commodore 64 in a browser). You were alone with the intro screen ``` *** COMMODORE 64 BASIC V2 *** 64K RAM SYSTEM 38911 BASIC BYTES FREE READY PLAYER ONE. ``` What else could you want in life :-D
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I can't believe that APress just published (Dec. 2018) this book. Amazon.com: Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing: Learn BASIC with a Commodore Emulator eBook: Gerald Friedland: Kindle Store[^]
Author says:
True story. I was looking for a system that would help 7-year olds teach themselves programming. Hey it's 2018, right? After looking through what's available, the two major issues that I have with the current tools are: 1) Many of them require the Internet (too dangerous for self learning) 2) most, if not all, of them are drag and drop. I wanted a non-distracting environment where the kids practice reading and writing while learning to program. The sensation of causing an action simply by typing a word is priceless.
I don't know. Maybe just use JavaScript in a browser to teach. It's much more relevant and has far fewer barriers to entry. I mean I would've really liked this book back in 1990 or before, but not sure this one will have a market.
I had to learn x86 assembly to detox from that old form of basic. It made learning modern languages difficult.
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Try again, my friend. JavaScript, as its namesake stands for is just a Scripting language akin to BASH and PowerShell. Yep, you can make it do great things, but with way too many caveats beginner wise. On the other hand, early 80s systems were complete development environments which presented themselves with no introduction and no serious booting (you can even run a commodore 64 in a browser). You were alone with the intro screen ``` *** COMMODORE 64 BASIC V2 *** 64K RAM SYSTEM 38911 BASIC BYTES FREE READY PLAYER ONE. ``` What else could you want in life :-D
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I had to learn x86 assembly to detox from that old form of basic. It made learning modern languages difficult.
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daflashrex wrote:
I had to learn x86 assembly to detox from that old form of basic. It made learning modern languages difficult.
That is very interesting. So assembly on commodore was really ugly then? How so?
It had already been a couple of decades by then so I didn't look at Commodores assembly.
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daflashrex wrote:
I had to learn x86 assembly to detox from that old form of basic. It made learning modern languages difficult.
That is very interesting. So assembly on commodore was really ugly then? How so?
I learned i386.