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> With modern machines, even without the discouragement of locked down operating systems, missing accessible programming languages and such... there is just no

> With modern machines, even without the discouragement of locked down operating systems, missing accessible programming languages and such... there is just no hope of making something "cool" you can impress your friends with. Every modern computing machine I know allows you to add a very rich set of coding tools, other than unjailbroken mobile devices perhaps. Yeah, poor access to mobile sucks, but if you feel the need to hack, you won't let walled gardens stop you. Web scraping is an insanely rich source of data for building cool tools. Then you might add a bit of simple machine learning, like a voice-based interface or a GAN-based video face-melter or visualizing web-scraped results on a map. These sorts of tricks were hard or impossible to do 10 or 20 years ago. But not today. If you want to hack, I'd start by immersing yourself in Linux. Or Raspberry Pi. Better yet, both.

IQunder130 6y ago
You are looking at this through the eyes of someone who is already comfortable with their understanding of computers and software. To a kid with no prior knowledge, the entry barriers might appear impossibly high.
- novok 6y ago
  No, they're lower than ever. They're one google search away from a huge amount of usable resources, youtube videos, web IDEs that they can use on their locked down iPad / School Chromebook and more.
  - IQunder130 6y ago
    And to do anything non-trivial requires years of tediously building up a knowledge of all the abstraction layers and dependencies between you and the machine. For a long time there is nothing you can do that a million others haven't already done far better and made readily accessible. I can personally attest to what a massive turn off this is. I grew up in an age when computers were a part of everyday life, but their inner workings - hidden behind a mountain of ugly obfuscation. If you find the rare trivial task like making stamped websites fascinating, good for you. But for people like me who couldn't care less, it takes some sort of external impetus to actually discover their interest in computing. In my case it was a half assed mandatory programming class in engineering school where I found out I had a talent for it, and discovered an interest in the inner workings of things I had been taking for granted all my life. Just because resources are easy to find doesn't mean anybody cares for finding them.

IQunder130 6y ago

You are looking at this through the eyes of someone who is already comfortable with their understanding of computers and software. To a kid with no prior knowledge, the entry barriers might appear impossibly high.

novok 6y ago
No, they're lower than ever. They're one google search away from a huge amount of usable resources, youtube videos, web IDEs that they can use on their locked down iPad / School Chromebook and more.
- IQunder130 6y ago
  And to do anything non-trivial requires years of tediously building up a knowledge of all the abstraction layers and dependencies between you and the machine. For a long time there is nothing you can do that a million others haven't already done far better and made readily accessible. I can personally attest to what a massive turn off this is. I grew up in an age when computers were a part of everyday life, but their inner workings - hidden behind a mountain of ugly obfuscation. If you find the rare trivial task like making stamped websites fascinating, good for you. But for people like me who couldn't care less, it takes some sort of external impetus to actually discover their interest in computing. In my case it was a half assed mandatory programming class in engineering school where I found out I had a talent for it, and discovered an interest in the inner workings of things I had been taking for granted all my life. Just because resources are easy to find doesn't mean anybody cares for finding them.