Miles Fidelman <mfidel...@meetinghouse.net> writes: > And seems to have turned into something about needing to recreate the > homebrew computing milieu, and everyone learning to program - and > perhaps "why don't more people know how to program?" > > My response (to the original question) is that folks who want to > write, may want something more flexible (programmable) than Word, but > somehow turning everone into c coders doesn't seem to be the answer.
Of course not. That's why there are languages like Python or Logo. > More flexible tools (e.g., HyperCard, spreadsheets) are more of an > answer - and that's a challenge to those of us who develop tools. > Turning writers, or mathematicians, or artists into coders is simply a > recipe for bad content AND bad code. But everyone learns mathematics, and even if they don't turn out professionnal mathematicians, they at least know how to make a simple demonstration (or at least we all did when I was in high school, so it's possible). Similarly, everyone should learn CS and programming, and even if they won't be able to manage software complexity at the same level as professionnal programmers (ought to be able to), they should be able to write simple programs, at the level of emacs commands, for their own needs, and foremost, they should understand enough of CS and programming to be able to have meaningful expectations from the computer industry and from programmers. -- __Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/ A bad day in () is better than a good day in {}. _______________________________________________ fonc mailing list fonc@vpri.org http://vpri.org/mailman/listinfo/fonc
