4 ms·

Our generation had distractions, too. TV, for example. I don't know the direct answer to your question but at least part of it is that 'not-forcing' your kid in

Our generation had distractions, too. TV, for example. I don't know the direct answer to your question but at least part of it is that 'not-forcing' your kid in to programming means they might just never be in to programming. My oldest is at least kind of in to programming (and also plays a lot of Minecraft and watches a lot of YouTube) my youngest two have shown zero interest in programing, but have interests of their own.

celrod 5y ago
Growing up, what my late father probably wanted most from me is for me to find a project of my own. When I was in high school, he once threatened me with "get a life, or I will get you one". Engines, and especially motorcycles, were always a passion of his. He grew up on a farm, and "was rebuilding tractor engines when the other kids were learning to ride bicycles." He still holds a few land speed records he set with motorcycles he designed and built. But I had no real hobbies or passions of my own, other than playing card games. It wasn't until my twenties, after I already graduated college with degrees I wasn't interested in and my dad's health failed, that I first tried programming. A decade earlier, my dad was attending the local Linux meetings when away from his machine shop. Programming, and especially performance optimization/loop vectorization are now my passion and consume most of my free time (https://github.com/JuliaSIMD/LoopVectorization.jl https://github.com/JuliaSIMD/LoopVectorization.jl). Hearing all the stories about people starting and getting hooked when they were 11 makes me feel like I lost a dozen years of my life. I had every opportunity, but just didn't take them. If I had children, I would worry for them.
- the_only_law 5y ago
  I got my start around 11 but kinda squandered it. Spent most of my time reading about random obscure languages/technologies/frameworks I wouldn’t understand until years later (though it’s great because I can hold a conversation on a topic for a little bit while being completely incompetent) and swearing I was going to make games until I realized I couldn’t do asset design worth shit. To this day I don’t think I’ve ever made (graphical) game. I was around 14 when I first heard about Haskell, I didn’t know anything about it, functional programming, type theory, lambda calculus or anything related. I just knew it was a programming language. Nowadays I see people around that age programming relatively fluently with it. All the actual programming I ever did as a kid was make terrible websites, console apps that did nothing useful in particular and a few desktop app shells that did the same. I was probably around 17 before I did anything “serious” and even at that point it wasn’t great. Now I’m not very old, so I’m not sure if it was simply the environment I was in, but I didn’t know that many other people that were into programming when I was a teenager, even with the internet and all I was normally the youngest guy in every chat/forum/site/group I was on. Nowadays though, I know several teenagers that could code circles around me.
  - schrijver 5y ago
    You left out… whether you had fun? Because it sounds like you feel your teenage hobby should have been a productive and focused use of your time leading to some kind of useful product. Which seems like a pretty high bar to set, and, like, besides the point?
- saalweachter 5y ago
  > Hearing all the stories about people starting and getting hooked when they were 11 makes me feel like I lost a dozen years of my life. To be totally honest, most of us who start programming when we are <some small age> don't really get that large of a head start. I'd probably count all of my programming experience from ages 10-20 before I switched from math to CS as "no more valuable than 1-2 years of dedicated undergraduate experience". The biggest value of early programming experience is learning if you enjoy it well enough to not hate a career at it.
- Tarsul 5y ago
  You'd worry like your dad, and in the end your kid would still find its way like you did :) Also, there's no use in regrets. Only lessons learned.
distribot 5y ago
Imo TV is so much worse than the kind of entertainment the person you're replying to listed. The cable TV I watched as a kid was just garbage. I know it's still all ad driven, but the stuff kids watch now seems much more useful. Roblox is programming.

celrod 5y ago

Growing up, what my late father probably wanted most from me is for me to find a project of my own. When I was in high school, he once threatened me with "get a life, or I will get you one". Engines, and especially motorcycles, were always a passion of his. He grew up on a farm, and "was rebuilding tractor engines when the other kids were learning to ride bicycles." He still holds a few land speed records he set with motorcycles he designed and built. But I had no real hobbies or passions of my own, other than playing card games. It wasn't until my twenties, after I already graduated college with degrees I wasn't interested in and my dad's health failed, that I first tried programming. A decade earlier, my dad was attending the local Linux meetings when away from his machine shop. Programming, and especially performance optimization/loop vectorization are now my passion and consume most of my free time (https://github.com/JuliaSIMD/LoopVectorization.jl https://github.com/JuliaSIMD/LoopVectorization.jl). Hearing all the stories about people starting and getting hooked when they were 11 makes me feel like I lost a dozen years of my life. I had every opportunity, but just didn't take them. If I had children, I would worry for them.

the_only_law 5y ago
I got my start around 11 but kinda squandered it. Spent most of my time reading about random obscure languages/technologies/frameworks I wouldn’t understand until years later (though it’s great because I can hold a conversation on a topic for a little bit while being completely incompetent) and swearing I was going to make games until I realized I couldn’t do asset design worth shit. To this day I don’t think I’ve ever made (graphical) game. I was around 14 when I first heard about Haskell, I didn’t know anything about it, functional programming, type theory, lambda calculus or anything related. I just knew it was a programming language. Nowadays I see people around that age programming relatively fluently with it. All the actual programming I ever did as a kid was make terrible websites, console apps that did nothing useful in particular and a few desktop app shells that did the same. I was probably around 17 before I did anything “serious” and even at that point it wasn’t great. Now I’m not very old, so I’m not sure if it was simply the environment I was in, but I didn’t know that many other people that were into programming when I was a teenager, even with the internet and all I was normally the youngest guy in every chat/forum/site/group I was on. Nowadays though, I know several teenagers that could code circles around me.
- schrijver 5y ago
  You left out… whether you had fun? Because it sounds like you feel your teenage hobby should have been a productive and focused use of your time leading to some kind of useful product. Which seems like a pretty high bar to set, and, like, besides the point?
saalweachter 5y ago
> Hearing all the stories about people starting and getting hooked when they were 11 makes me feel like I lost a dozen years of my life. To be totally honest, most of us who start programming when we are <some small age> don't really get that large of a head start. I'd probably count all of my programming experience from ages 10-20 before I switched from math to CS as "no more valuable than 1-2 years of dedicated undergraduate experience". The biggest value of early programming experience is learning if you enjoy it well enough to not hate a career at it.
Tarsul 5y ago
You'd worry like your dad, and in the end your kid would still find its way like you did :) Also, there's no use in regrets. Only lessons learned.

distribot 5y ago

Imo TV is so much worse than the kind of entertainment the person you're replying to listed. The cable TV I watched as a kid was just garbage. I know it's still all ad driven, but the stuff kids watch now seems much more useful. Roblox is programming.