Re: models of creativity in programming

[guzdial]

Also relevant to this discussion is Richard Gabriel's proposal for a Masters of 
Fine Arts in Software:

http://www.dreamsongs.com/MFASoftware.html


On 3/23/10 1:13 PM, Neil neil.er...@gmail.com wrote:

It strikes me that perhaps we emphasize the role of creativity too
much in the arts. How much of what we term creativity is due to insane
expertise and breadth of knowledge? Cezanne had not only a new take on
capturing light, but also tremendous ability with the medium he'd
chosen (both learned and inherited, I would assume).

The film It might get loud shows three guitarists, all of whom I
would deem creative geniuses, demonstrating very clearly the
importance of repetition and hard work in their success.

In a similar vein, I think there are journeyperson programmers and
master programmers. If the latter are fortunate enough to be in the
right situation (I think the App Store for IPhone is a good example of
a 'creative ecosystem' for software), truly inspired creations can
arise.

Perhaps another interesting question can be posed: who is responsible
for creativity in physical buildings (an overused analogy in software,
but perhaps relevant here)? Is it the architect, who sketches the
shape on a napkin? Or the engineer, who determines how to make the
bulging metal protusions watertight? Or the metalworker who derives a
new tool to weld the pieces together?

On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 11:54 AM, Alan Blackwell
alan.blackw...@cl.cam.ac.uk wrote:
 And that reminds me of the many years of great work that has
 been done by Gerhard Fischer at Boulder:

 http://l3d.cs.colorado.edu/~gerhard/

 See, for example, his work with the NSF Create IT programme:
 http://swiki.cs.colorado.edu:3232/CreativeIT

 Alan

 Another interesting take on this is creativity vs. rationale in design.

 Jack Carroll hosted a workshop on this, one report of which can be found
 here:

 http://john.daughtryhome.com/publications/DAUGHTRY_BURGE_CARROLL_POTTS_SEN_2009.pdf






 On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 10:37 AM, Alan Blackwell 
 alan.blackw...@cl.cam.ac.uk wrote:

 
  steven.cla...@microsoft.com said:
I've always found the following essay quite inspirational in
   the way that it describes two different styles of programming.
   http://www.papert.org/articles/EpistemologicalPluralism.html
 
  I agree that essay raises interesting points, but I believe it
  also has some significant weaknesses, as explained here:
 
  http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~afb21/publications/Bricolage.pdf
 
  (Their argument is one originating in gender studies, but more
  recent work in gender and programming suggests that their sample
  may have been too small and too specific to carry the weight of
  general conclusions that they draw).
 
  Alan
  --
  Alan Blackwell
  Reader in Interdisciplinary Design, University of Cambridge
  Further details from www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~afb21/
 
 
  --
  The Open University is incorporated by Royal Charter (RC 000391), an exempt
  charity in England  Wales and a charity registered in Scotland (SC 
  038302).
 
 


 --
 Alan Blackwell
 Reader in Interdisciplinary Design, University of Cambridge
 Further details from www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~afb21/

Re: models of creativity in programming

[Lindsay Marshall]

On 23 Mar 2010, at 17:31, guzd...@cc.gatech.edu wrote:

 Also relevant to this discussion is Richard Gabriel’s proposal for a Masters 
 of Fine Arts in Software:
 
 http://www.dreamsongs.com/MFASoftware.html
 

I really like that idea a lot and agree with much of what he says. I've been 
wanting to start doing Design style regular crit sessions for students 
developing programs but the class sizes simply mitigate against it,

An earlier message was suggesting that expertise + knowledge (is this skill??) 
was much the same as creativity and I have sympathy with this point, but you do 
see highly creative solutions to problems developed by people with no expertise 
or knowledge. Maybe this is just dumb luck of course and there may be aspect of 
that in it too.

However I would also add failure into the mix - creativity is a lot to do with 
failing and keeping going. You can do this with music and paint and literature 
and software, it's a bit harder to do it (or to be allowed to do it anyway) 
with bridges and aeroplanes and medicines. (Note I am not denying the creative 
aspects  of building bridges etc.)

You know what they say about overnight success taking a lot of years of hard 
work.

I also suspect that none of as are likely to agree on this topic.

L.

-- 
The Open University is incorporated by Royal Charter (RC 000391), an exempt 
charity in England  Wales and a charity registered in Scotland (SC 038302).

Re: models of creativity in programming

[Derek M Jones]

Lindsay,


I think that the role of creativity in programming is vastly
overestimated.


I have to disagree, I think it is vastly underestimated.


This is only because you live in a world (ie, academia)
here the aim is to be creative.


Most algorithms are very simple and frequently used.
In fact developers seem to have a small repertoire of techniques
they use most of the time.


Which is also what composers do (since that has been used already, but also 
painters - a better analogy in IMHO). It's what makes your style.


My contribution to the numbers program is 1,000 lines of
dull code.  I say no point spending time to make it
interesting to read.  The only code that readers might
find interesting was not written by me.  I needed a hash
table library and so found the source of one
via the web, plus a hash function written by somebody else.

I have found various other source libraries that might be of use
to me and I plan to continue to write dull code.


For instance, 'numbers' is a project I am currently working on


The creative part of this project is figuring out what constitutes
an interesting number and how it might best be matched against.
The code is trivial, as it is in most commercial projects.

--
Derek M. Jones tel: +44 (0) 1252 520 667
Knowledge Software Ltd mailto:de...@knosof.co.uk
Source code analysis   http://www.knosof.co.uk

--
The Open University is incorporated by Royal Charter (RC 000391), an exempt charity 
in England  Wales and a charity registered in Scotland (SC 038302).