4 ms·
Point well taken: School is a time to learn things that the practical world won't pressure you to learn, and you will learn the practical stuff once you're hire
by bkovitz 17y ago
Point well taken: School is a time to learn things that the practical world won't pressure you to learn, and you will learn the practical stuff once you're hired.
But. I have seen so many college graduates, who've spent four years taking classes and passing exams, who still can't program. Programming is a craft. You learn it mostly by writing real code. If you lack the craft knowledge, the deep, theoretical insights are just words.
- baguasquirrel 17y agoHaving people practice programming in school is well-intentioned, but does it work? I went to CMU, which has a reputation for programming rigor. Just a month ago, a former classmate asked me if adding two doubles would preserve the fractional component. Now keep in mind that this was someone who had to learn how the IEEE double is actually implemented (i.e. how they represent it in 64 bits), who had once implemented his own network stack --in C. I was surprised because most people I knew who didn't like programming had quit doing it years ago. See, you don't make good programmers by teaching them python in intro any more than you make good programmers by teaching them how to write their own network stack.