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When I arrived at university we had to do a Haskell course first. I didn’t realize it at the time because it just felt backwards, but it was a great “reset” of
by alkonaut 5y ago
When I arrived at university we had to do a Haskell course first. I didn’t realize it at the time because it just felt backwards, but it was a great “reset” of the minds of everyone like me who had done C64 Basic and Pascal. It also served as a great equalizer in the class when some people had never programmed while some of us had done it for 15 years. The Haskell course put everyone on an equal footing.
- aardvark179 5y agoLikewise, but ML rather than Haskell.
- fanf2 5y agoyeah but even so, some of us learned ML before arriving :-)
- throwaway2037 5y ago"When I arrived at university" -- Usually 18 years old. Then: "while some of us had done it for 15 years" -- I'm confused. Are some people learning to program a 3 years old? This is breaking new records for HN exceptionalism.
- alkonaut 5y agoUniversity is often 19 or 20 here (mandatory military service!) but obviously there is no upper limit; some in my class had done it for 15 years (possibly more, we had people with existing careers, but they were older than me). I was 20 and had programmed for ~12 years at the time. Obviously zero years professionally.
- throwaway2037 5y agoGreat point about mandatory military service. I did not consider it. In Korea, you can go after you university.