4 ms·

Reaching out and providing scholarships and generally giving a leg up is not how this gap will be closed. It has never been about teaching women to code, excep

by LanceH 13y ago

Reaching out and providing scholarships and generally giving a leg up is not how this gap will be closed. It has never been about teaching women to code, except at the bare minimum "I can get a job at a giant company where I'll write 2000 lines of code in a year." It's about right clicking with your mouse to see if there are any other options available. Googling for your answer before you ask someone else. Asking questions on stackoverflow. Hacking and reading at night to figure out something that may or may not be for work. Recompiling the source code to make it bend to your will. There is a price to be paid, and it doesn't have to do with money. As was said thousands of years ago, "There is no royal road to Geometry." It is the same today. All these solutions that don't involve paying that price are destined to fail. College age is too late. Middle school may be the last opportunity for any real percentage of women to be affected. It's not about completing classes.

thenmar 13y ago
Wait, are you saying that college is too late to learn how to program?
- erichocean 13y ago
  I didn't begin programming until college (I'm a white male in the US), and I've gotten paid to do it ever since. That's me on the AUTHORS list for Google Chrome's v8 engine [0] (I ported it, and Node.js, to Solaris if your curious), so I'm at least competent enough to do that. Anyway, that's proof that it can be done, and at a level that make a difference somewhere. :) That said, I don't like to code, so maybe that has something to do with why I started late. I was into computers from pre-school onwards, though. [0] https://code.google.com/p/v8/source/browse/branches/bleeding_edge/AUTHORS?r=5437#16 https://code.google.com/p/v8/source/browse/branches/bleeding...
  - LanceH 13y ago
    I didn't begin programming until after college, actually. But I had a math degree by then (theoretical math, not even applied). I had developed that curiosity and drive, however, and I think college is too late for that. edit - I mean for large numbers. The exceptions are always wonderful to see. another edit - I also don't think that most programming is about programming, it's about figuring out how things work. Just learning to program doesn't help with programming very much. "Figuring out how things work" needs a name, and that's what needs to be taught.
  - auggierose 13y ago
    Actually you are a good confirmation of the bias. You didn't start until college, and you don't like to code.
- jerf 13y ago
  I think the argument is that statistically speaking, it's too late to produce passion in large quantities. It's not just about one person discovering code, it's about getting enough to close the gap. I'm not sure I agree... many people discover things in college that they've never heard of and subsequently major in. But it's at least debatable.
- meritt 13y ago
  I interpreted it as if the individual doesn't have an innate curiosity and need for answers, how things work, how to tweak things, an endless desire to learn. If they don't have that "hacker spirit", then it's unlikely they are going to be immensely successful or game-changing. Anyone can get a job doing coding from learning it at any age.
- betterunix 13y ago
  Is college too late to learn arithmetic? I would equate the two; in fact, I have wondered for a while if we could actually replace arithmetic lessons in elementary school with programming lessons (and have students learn arithmetic by implementing it in code). You still have a malleable brain in college, but picking up an entirely new way to think becomes harder as you age.
- jleyank 13y ago
  Gee, I don't know. Grace Hopper learned to program quite late in life and she did ok. Maybe it's not WHEN people start to code, it's HOW they start to code and whether they learn while doing it? Big-time athletes don't appear because they were kings of the middle-school playground for 10 years, they participate in an increasingly intensive program that winnows out pretty much everybody who participates. I don't think that we see a huge number of failed programmers ending up as insurance salesmen or financial advisors because they blew out a knee.
erichocean 13y ago
I can get a job at a giant company where I'll write 2000 lines of code in a year. Wait, what? 2000 lines of code per year? Having never worked in a "giant" company, is that typical? I do that in about 10 days at a normal pace, and can do it in five if I'm really pushing it to meet a deadline or whatever. Anyway, I thought 4K LOC/month was pretty standard for programmers of all stripes, or ~50K LOC/year. Is it really just 2K? /shocked
- sbt 13y ago
  Yes, 4k LOC/months is standard, regardless if you write assembly, haskell or C. whether you work through a mill of bureaucracy or you are in charge of your own project. These 2k LOC/year coders must surely be unproductive.
  - kordless 13y ago
    I'm sorry, but that's just a false blaming statement and completely counterproductive to the conversation. There is absolutely zero evidence correlating LOC and productivity. About the only time you could link LOC to productivity is in the very early stages of a project - where some type of visible progress is needed to plan for a possible feature set for the release. Sarcastic statements are considered to be negative blaming statements. They don't help the conversation.
    - gejjaxxita 13y ago
      I think they were being sarcastic.
- ceejayoz 13y ago
  Some of the best coders I've seen probably have negative LOC/month counts.
  - ubernostrum 13y ago
    I am a huge fan of deleting code. And I've landed commits that killed thousands of lines in one go, so I'm pretty sure I'm in the negative.
rayiner 13y ago
I think that's hogwash. The things you suggested: > It's about right clicking with your mouse to see if there are any other options available. Googling for your answer before you ask someone else. Asking questions on stackoverflow. Hacking and reading at night to figure out something that may or may not be for work. Recompiling the source code to make it bend to your will. These are things people can be trained to do. The real problem here is that software engineering is still in the dark ages. We overvalue people who have been "hacking since middle school" because we can't systematically articulate the skills a good programmer should have and how we can train people in those skills. But this is purely a function of the immaturity of the field. There is nothing magic about software development that requires it to be perpetually stuck in the dark ages of ad-hoc craft.
- frenchy 13y ago
  > We overvalue people who have been "hacking since middle school" Nothing specifically Dark Ages about this. I think that's true with many fields. It's the theme of the child prodigy. A painter, a violinist, an athelete would all be given special notice if the excelled at these skills at a young age. One would expect an excellent engineer to grow up playing with legos or building toy bridges. Perhaps this is a practice that doesn't do us any good, and should be done away with, but it is not at all limited to programming.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    As to engineers, while people might expect that correlation to exist, no company actually cares whether a candidate played with legos as a kid. It would be absurd to even bring it up in an interview. Engineering companies expect that any skills you need to do the job will either have been taught in school, or will be taught to you by the company. What's "dark ages" is grouping programmers together with painters or violinists or athletes rather than other engineers. It's the result of not having a systematic theory of the skills necessary for the profession, and not having a way of taking people with the requisite mathematical aptitude and instilling those skills in a formal way.
  - crusso 13y ago

by LanceH 13y ago

thenmar 13y ago

Wait, are you saying that college is too late to learn how to program?

erichocean 13y ago
I didn't begin programming until college (I'm a white male in the US), and I've gotten paid to do it ever since. That's me on the AUTHORS list for Google Chrome's v8 engine [0] (I ported it, and Node.js, to Solaris if your curious), so I'm at least competent enough to do that. Anyway, that's proof that it can be done, and at a level that make a difference somewhere. :) That said, I don't like to code, so maybe that has something to do with why I started late. I was into computers from pre-school onwards, though. [0] https://code.google.com/p/v8/source/browse/branches/bleeding_edge/AUTHORS?r=5437#16 https://code.google.com/p/v8/source/browse/branches/bleeding...
- LanceH 13y ago
  I didn't begin programming until after college, actually. But I had a math degree by then (theoretical math, not even applied). I had developed that curiosity and drive, however, and I think college is too late for that. edit - I mean for large numbers. The exceptions are always wonderful to see. another edit - I also don't think that most programming is about programming, it's about figuring out how things work. Just learning to program doesn't help with programming very much. "Figuring out how things work" needs a name, and that's what needs to be taught.
- auggierose 13y ago
  Actually you are a good confirmation of the bias. You didn't start until college, and you don't like to code.
jerf 13y ago
I think the argument is that statistically speaking, it's too late to produce passion in large quantities. It's not just about one person discovering code, it's about getting enough to close the gap. I'm not sure I agree... many people discover things in college that they've never heard of and subsequently major in. But it's at least debatable.
meritt 13y ago
I interpreted it as if the individual doesn't have an innate curiosity and need for answers, how things work, how to tweak things, an endless desire to learn. If they don't have that "hacker spirit", then it's unlikely they are going to be immensely successful or game-changing. Anyone can get a job doing coding from learning it at any age.
betterunix 13y ago
Is college too late to learn arithmetic? I would equate the two; in fact, I have wondered for a while if we could actually replace arithmetic lessons in elementary school with programming lessons (and have students learn arithmetic by implementing it in code). You still have a malleable brain in college, but picking up an entirely new way to think becomes harder as you age.
jleyank 13y ago
Gee, I don't know. Grace Hopper learned to program quite late in life and she did ok. Maybe it's not WHEN people start to code, it's HOW they start to code and whether they learn while doing it? Big-time athletes don't appear because they were kings of the middle-school playground for 10 years, they participate in an increasingly intensive program that winnows out pretty much everybody who participates. I don't think that we see a huge number of failed programmers ending up as insurance salesmen or financial advisors because they blew out a knee.

erichocean 13y ago

I can get a job at a giant company where I'll write 2000 lines of code in a year. Wait, what? 2000 lines of code per year? Having never worked in a "giant" company, is that typical? I do that in about 10 days at a normal pace, and can do it in five if I'm really pushing it to meet a deadline or whatever. Anyway, I thought 4K LOC/month was pretty standard for programmers of all stripes, or ~50K LOC/year. Is it really just 2K? /shocked

sbt 13y ago
Yes, 4k LOC/months is standard, regardless if you write assembly, haskell or C. whether you work through a mill of bureaucracy or you are in charge of your own project. These 2k LOC/year coders must surely be unproductive.
- kordless 13y ago
  I'm sorry, but that's just a false blaming statement and completely counterproductive to the conversation. There is absolutely zero evidence correlating LOC and productivity. About the only time you could link LOC to productivity is in the very early stages of a project - where some type of visible progress is needed to plan for a possible feature set for the release. Sarcastic statements are considered to be negative blaming statements. They don't help the conversation.
  - gejjaxxita 13y ago
    I think they were being sarcastic.
ceejayoz 13y ago
Some of the best coders I've seen probably have negative LOC/month counts.
- ubernostrum 13y ago
  I am a huge fan of deleting code. And I've landed commits that killed thousands of lines in one go, so I'm pretty sure I'm in the negative.

rayiner 13y ago

I think that's hogwash. The things you suggested: > It's about right clicking with your mouse to see if there are any other options available. Googling for your answer before you ask someone else. Asking questions on stackoverflow. Hacking and reading at night to figure out something that may or may not be for work. Recompiling the source code to make it bend to your will. These are things people can be trained to do. The real problem here is that software engineering is still in the dark ages. We overvalue people who have been "hacking since middle school" because we can't systematically articulate the skills a good programmer should have and how we can train people in those skills. But this is purely a function of the immaturity of the field. There is nothing magic about software development that requires it to be perpetually stuck in the dark ages of ad-hoc craft.

frenchy 13y ago
> We overvalue people who have been "hacking since middle school" Nothing specifically Dark Ages about this. I think that's true with many fields. It's the theme of the child prodigy. A painter, a violinist, an athelete would all be given special notice if the excelled at these skills at a young age. One would expect an excellent engineer to grow up playing with legos or building toy bridges. Perhaps this is a practice that doesn't do us any good, and should be done away with, but it is not at all limited to programming.
- rayiner 13y ago
  As to engineers, while people might expect that correlation to exist, no company actually cares whether a candidate played with legos as a kid. It would be absurd to even bring it up in an interview. Engineering companies expect that any skills you need to do the job will either have been taught in school, or will be taught to you by the company. What's "dark ages" is grouping programmers together with painters or violinists or athletes rather than other engineers. It's the result of not having a systematic theory of the skills necessary for the profession, and not having a way of taking people with the requisite mathematical aptitude and instilling those skills in a formal way.
- crusso 13y ago