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It's all just a degree of abstraction. Someone could say you were "programming" if you were using Automator. Explain more specifically to what level you think

It's all just a degree of abstraction. Someone could say you were "programming" if you were using Automator. Explain more specifically to what level you think people should be programming their computers, because I think it will never happen to the level of writing actual high-level language source code, ala Python. People like looking at and clicking on/touching/interacting with pretty pictures/icons. I guess you might mean something that allows people to piece together actions (functions) to describe some goal they'd like. For example, "Purchase with CREDIT CARD -> from GROCERY STORE -> LAST WEEK'S GROCERY LIST -> deliver to HOME ADDRESS -> after TUESDAY CLASS TIME". Isn't Ubiquity trying to act as something like natural language processing in Firefox?

jasongullickson 17y ago
It's all just a degree of abstraction. I disagree in that when learning to program in BASIC on the Apple II, you are a mere PEEK and POKE away from the hardware; go any lower than that and you are no longer talking about abstraction (as we refer to it) but hard realities of electrical engineering. One floor down and you are the common denominator that defines everything we refer to as a "computer" (in the modern vernacular) and mastering this will provide you with insight which spans across all contemporary systems and many in the perceivable future. Setting the "ground floor" of programming at anything above this level narrows your scope and greatly increases the potential of your knowledge becoming obsolete. Someday this will change, and the basis of future systems will not be rooted in the hardware models of today, and it will be great because then we'll all have something new to learn.