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I'm sure that my kids will certainly love to hear that they have to learn Unix in order to learn a build system in order to try out Python. It's all part of th

I'm sure that my kids will certainly love to hear that they have to learn Unix in order to learn a build system in order to try out Python. It's all part of the "learning process for newbies."

saghm 7y ago
> learn Unix in order to learn a build system in order to try out Python I definitely understand that the installation process for things like python can be confusing to non-programmers, but I think this is a bit disingenuous. You don't have to learn a build system to install it; python was the first programming language I ever learned, and I used it years before I ever even had any idea what a build system is.
photojosh 7y ago
Good grief. What's wrong with going to www.python.org/downloads/ and clicking the big button at the top that says "Download the latest version for Mac OS X"? If you can't even download an installer and run it, then yeah, maybe not quite ready for programming either. Please forgive my snark, but this would be exactly my thought process as a reasonably competent computer user who wanted to learn Python.
- jasonkester 7y ago
  He’s right though. When I was six years old, learning to program involved turning on the computer and typing 10 print “hello” run That’s what I want for my kids. And there’s nothing even remotely like it in today’s world.
  - em500 7y ago
    Open Terminal $ echo "hello" seems pretty much the same to me. Even on Windows you can open the browser console and do > console.log("hello") Just for teaching basic prints, variables, loops and functions, terminal bash on macOS/Linux or Javascript console work just as well as Commodore 64 BASIC. The problem is not that the environment is not available or setup is too difficult. The problem is that there's now way more competition from other shinies readily available (web, apps, games, videos). Even if you boot your home PC straight into a terminal, as soon as the kids find the way to a web browser it's game over. Even on 1980s home micros, if the kids got access to (pirated) games, practically none would volunterily keep on programming BASIC.
    - zelos 7y ago
      Teaching bash scripting as an introduction to programming? Surely there are laws against that kind of cruelty?
      - em500 7y ago
        It's certainly not any worse than BASIC on 1980s home micro's. (IMO it's not any worse than Python either.)
  - Fnoord 7y ago
    When you were 6 years old is a different time from now. You probably did not have an always-on connection. There was probably no such thing as Web 2.0. Computers were more difficult to use. Google did not exist. The Internet was perhaps still taking off...
  - skocznymroczny 7y ago
    And then I remember that there wasn't much more to offer, because most "fun" functionality involved POKE'ing 'random' memory addresses.

I'm sure that my kids will certainly love to hear that they have to learn Unix in order to learn a build system in order to try out Python. It's all part of the "learning process for newbies."

saghm 7y ago

> learn Unix in order to learn a build system in order to try out Python I definitely understand that the installation process for things like python can be confusing to non-programmers, but I think this is a bit disingenuous. You don't have to learn a build system to install it; python was the first programming language I ever learned, and I used it years before I ever even had any idea what a build system is.

photojosh 7y ago

Good grief. What's wrong with going to www.python.org/downloads/ and clicking the big button at the top that says "Download the latest version for Mac OS X"? If you can't even download an installer and run it, then yeah, maybe not quite ready for programming either. Please forgive my snark, but this would be exactly my thought process as a reasonably competent computer user who wanted to learn Python.

jasonkester 7y ago
He’s right though. When I was six years old, learning to program involved turning on the computer and typing 10 print “hello” run That’s what I want for my kids. And there’s nothing even remotely like it in today’s world.
- em500 7y ago
  Open Terminal $ echo "hello" seems pretty much the same to me. Even on Windows you can open the browser console and do > console.log("hello") Just for teaching basic prints, variables, loops and functions, terminal bash on macOS/Linux or Javascript console work just as well as Commodore 64 BASIC. The problem is not that the environment is not available or setup is too difficult. The problem is that there's now way more competition from other shinies readily available (web, apps, games, videos). Even if you boot your home PC straight into a terminal, as soon as the kids find the way to a web browser it's game over. Even on 1980s home micros, if the kids got access to (pirated) games, practically none would volunterily keep on programming BASIC.
  - zelos 7y ago
    Teaching bash scripting as an introduction to programming? Surely there are laws against that kind of cruelty?
    - em500 7y ago
      It's certainly not any worse than BASIC on 1980s home micro's. (IMO it's not any worse than Python either.)
- Fnoord 7y ago
  When you were 6 years old is a different time from now. You probably did not have an always-on connection. There was probably no such thing as Web 2.0. Computers were more difficult to use. Google did not exist. The Internet was perhaps still taking off...
- skocznymroczny 7y ago
  And then I remember that there wasn't much more to offer, because most "fun" functionality involved POKE'ing 'random' memory addresses.