"I'd argue passing AP calc in high school is 90% of the battle. If you can tackle that the basics of programming are nothing." As a math major who took on prog

"I'd argue passing AP calc in high school is 90% of the battle. If you can tackle that the basics of programming are nothing." As a math major who took on programming later in life than most, I feel a lot of ambivalence about this statement. Data structures and algorithms, and even basic control flow, is more complex than I think you're making it out to be. Zed Shaw made an excellent point about this when he wrote about the "pipe" for boolean OR. He pointed out that you aren't just teaching people about boolean logic. While they're trying to understand the concepts, they are also wondering what you mean when you say to use the "pipe". In fact, you can't even say use the | character, because very intelligent people may have never used this to the point that they weren't aware that there was a | character, yet these people could make exceptional programmers given a bit more time and the right intro material. This isn't just a nitpick, I always cringe when I people downplay the rigor of programming, even basic programming. It isn't easy at all, it takes hard work. My own experience as a math major who took on programming a bit late in life is that there is a pretty tough hurdle at the beginning (one that I felt Zed identified very well through his "pipe" example). I also think that people should take more pride in learning to program - while we could quibble over what the "basics" are, I'd put it up there with my more rigorous math and engineering coursework.