It looks like the author did not take their humanities conversation seriously. All the humanities person wanted was for the students to understand databases and

It looks like the author did not take their humanities conversation seriously. All the humanities person wanted was for the students to understand databases and the use of templates to present database information. Why the use of Snap at all? All the students need to understand is information is maintained in a database, and here's one simple way to make a template, which when run though this "software black box" replaces the template variables with database information. That software black box being nothing more than a string replacement engine. That is all they really need. The use of Snap feels like still clinging to the idea that the students "must program", when writing a template already is programming.