Agreed. My day job revolves around "visual dev tools" like VVVV, Reaktor and Unity/Playmaker, and "Should I use a GUI or a scripting language" is rarely the is

Agreed. My day job revolves around "visual dev tools" like VVVV, Reaktor and Unity/Playmaker, and "Should I use a GUI or a scripting language" is rarely the issue. I've seen Art Students learn the basics of C# rather easily, same for the java dialect used by Processing. The biggest issue are always the skills required to bring their ideas into actual code. Most of those tools still require an extremely advanced knowledge of calculus, DSP theory and linear algebra. Imagine if a fashion designer wanted to display a set of generative images displayed in the background following the catwalk ground vibrations (this was a real request). Even if he/she could accurately describe their idea, that would be still several magnitudes outside their STEM Skills. Most of the times we end up hiring an external dev who will be forced to use such visual tools, making his job even worse.