5 ms·

I will always regret having typed in pages and pages of DATA to end up with a really rubbish side-scroller. Let's not inflict this on another generation :)

jacquesm 17y ago
I used to read hex-dumps over the phone with my buddy, complete with checksum in the 'pre-affordable-modem' days. DATA statements aside, typing in reams of code from hard copy certainly ingrained the ability to predict what the code did long before finishing the typing in, and I'm sure that is something that comes in handy even today when scanning other peoples' code. I think it is harder today to get started programming than it ever was in the past, the 'bar for entry' is no longer some crappy little game you can write in three days but some three-d studio produced glitzy epic adventure. No way 'block shoots block' is going to live up to that, even if you did write all of it yourself, and the 'enterprise' being the red block isn't much of a winner either. Computers are no longer 'knowable', and this is another matter that needs addressing if we really want to lower the bar for understanding what goes on under the hood.
- bphogan 17y ago
  BLock shoots block is just fine for a 4th grader - at least it is for my kid. And I think computers are knowable. Some languages are not, but others are. Ruby has a REPL that's very good as a teaching tool. I've had a lot of luck teaching with that. C++ on the other hand, or even Java, not so much. I know it's harder than it was, but we could change that as long as we don't decide to fail by defeating ourselves.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    With knowable I mean that you could at some point in the past literally know each line of code present in the memory of your machine. That's no longer the case.
- ido 17y ago
  No way 'block shoots block' is going to live up to that, even if you did write all of it yourself, and the 'enterprise' being the red block isn't much of a winner either. I used to think like you do, but my little nieces and nephews proved me wrong.

jacquesm 17y ago

I used to read hex-dumps over the phone with my buddy, complete with checksum in the 'pre-affordable-modem' days. DATA statements aside, typing in reams of code from hard copy certainly ingrained the ability to predict what the code did long before finishing the typing in, and I'm sure that is something that comes in handy even today when scanning other peoples' code. I think it is harder today to get started programming than it ever was in the past, the 'bar for entry' is no longer some crappy little game you can write in three days but some three-d studio produced glitzy epic adventure. No way 'block shoots block' is going to live up to that, even if you did write all of it yourself, and the 'enterprise' being the red block isn't much of a winner either. Computers are no longer 'knowable', and this is another matter that needs addressing if we really want to lower the bar for understanding what goes on under the hood.

bphogan 17y ago
BLock shoots block is just fine for a 4th grader - at least it is for my kid. And I think computers are knowable. Some languages are not, but others are. Ruby has a REPL that's very good as a teaching tool. I've had a lot of luck teaching with that. C++ on the other hand, or even Java, not so much. I know it's harder than it was, but we could change that as long as we don't decide to fail by defeating ourselves.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  With knowable I mean that you could at some point in the past literally know each line of code present in the memory of your machine. That's no longer the case.
ido 17y ago
No way 'block shoots block' is going to live up to that, even if you did write all of it yourself, and the 'enterprise' being the red block isn't much of a winner either. I used to think like you do, but my little nieces and nephews proved me wrong.