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I agree. I think we will continue to abstract our communication with machines until the act of having to type code into a computer is a task that is largely onl

I agree. I think we will continue to abstract our communication with machines until the act of having to type code into a computer is a task that is largely only performed by a small subset of society (programmers). But even when the day of having to do very minimal physical coding to direct computers arrives, I think there are still many benefits for the majority of people to learning this crude and dated form of coding. Perhaps not necessarily to become programmers, but to at least have some understanding of the guts of machines that power society. In fact, I think the further removed we get from the physical code in directing machines, the stronger the imperative we have to expect future generations to understand not just what something is, but how and why it works.

jdiez17 13y ago
I wholeheartedly agree. I was talking to my professors the other day about this; I think writing code will have be similar to capturing photographs: before, only professionals could take a picture: they had to operate this complicated machine, and then they had to develop the film in a dark room by impregnating them with chemicals. Nowadays, most of the population has an immensely capable camera in their pocket. I foresee that something similar will happen with programming. Most people will be able to command their computer and teach them to do new things, without having to know the first thing about how they actually work. There will still be people that fiddle with data structures and pathfinding algorithms, but they will be doing it for research purposes or because they need a highly specialised application.
- lispylol 13y ago
  Yeah, I think photography is a good analogy for capturing (no pun intended) this trend. And maybe I'm just being overly sentimental, but I feel like because it's so easy to do things with our devices now without knowing how they work, that they're often under-appreciated. For example, there's this popular interview that Louis C.K did on Conan, where he said "Everything's awesome, and nobody's happy". Sure, most of that frustration can be attributed to the human condition, but ignorance also plays a big role. If people knew (and I don't) how planes actually worked (at at basic level, of course), it's harder to get frustrated about spotty Wifi.

jdiez17 13y ago

I wholeheartedly agree. I was talking to my professors the other day about this; I think writing code will have be similar to capturing photographs: before, only professionals could take a picture: they had to operate this complicated machine, and then they had to develop the film in a dark room by impregnating them with chemicals. Nowadays, most of the population has an immensely capable camera in their pocket. I foresee that something similar will happen with programming. Most people will be able to command their computer and teach them to do new things, without having to know the first thing about how they actually work. There will still be people that fiddle with data structures and pathfinding algorithms, but they will be doing it for research purposes or because they need a highly specialised application.

lispylol 13y ago
Yeah, I think photography is a good analogy for capturing (no pun intended) this trend. And maybe I'm just being overly sentimental, but I feel like because it's so easy to do things with our devices now without knowing how they work, that they're often under-appreciated. For example, there's this popular interview that Louis C.K did on Conan, where he said "Everything's awesome, and nobody's happy". Sure, most of that frustration can be attributed to the human condition, but ignorance also plays a big role. If people knew (and I don't) how planes actually worked (at at basic level, of course), it's harder to get frustrated about spotty Wifi.