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Interesting... It seems to me that FP is having quite a renaissance recently, which could limit the relevance of that paper's contentions today. I'm also seein

by yzzxy 12y ago

Interesting... It seems to me that FP is having quite a renaissance recently, which could limit the relevance of that paper's contentions today. I'm also seeing quite a backlash against OOP and especially OOP as the One True Paradigm that it was pushed as in throughout the 00s - this can be seen not only in FP language growth but also in the design of other new languages like Go that lack many OOP features. Honestly, I would argue for the "Never Compromise" route for undergraduate regardless of current trends. I've found firsthand that mid-to-high-achieving high school students are able to grep SICP just fine, even if they haven't been introduced to calculus as of yet. But I haven't read HtDP or PPL yet, so I can't really pass judgement on which book would be better.

shriramkmurthi 12y ago
The paper's premise is a broad one. Its authors are hard-core functional programmers, but believe that eventually students have to learn something beyond just pure FP. Too often, introductory curricula are designed with a "screw what happens later" attitude, which ends up being self-defeating. The paper's point is that they should instead provide a gradual progression, and that this progression should be over at least two different time-scales.
dagw 12y ago
It seems to me that FP is having quite a renaissance recently It seems that FP is always having a renaissance. I distinctly recall lots of people (including me) talking in 2001-2002 about the big FP renaissance just round corner. I also recall a few old school lisper rolling their eyes at us and saying that they where saying the same thing back in the early-mid 80's.
- shriramkmurthi 12y ago
  Doesn't mean it's not true. There is now hard-core industrial use growing, which has never quite been true in the past two decades. Not to mention, mainstream languages have mostly all now accepted the starting premise of FP (closures as first-class values). That's the first step; there are many more to come. Old Lispers' eyes are stuck in a permanent roll position, like the Agena-Gemini 8 dock.

by yzzxy 12y ago

shriramkmurthi 12y ago

The paper's premise is a broad one. Its authors are hard-core functional programmers, but believe that eventually students have to learn something beyond just pure FP. Too often, introductory curricula are designed with a "screw what happens later" attitude, which ends up being self-defeating. The paper's point is that they should instead provide a gradual progression, and that this progression should be over at least two different time-scales.

dagw 12y ago

It seems to me that FP is having quite a renaissance recently It seems that FP is always having a renaissance. I distinctly recall lots of people (including me) talking in 2001-2002 about the big FP renaissance just round corner. I also recall a few old school lisper rolling their eyes at us and saying that they where saying the same thing back in the early-mid 80's.

shriramkmurthi 12y ago
Doesn't mean it's not true. There is now hard-core industrial use growing, which has never quite been true in the past two decades. Not to mention, mainstream languages have mostly all now accepted the starting premise of FP (closures as first-class values). That's the first step; there are many more to come. Old Lispers' eyes are stuck in a permanent roll position, like the Agena-Gemini 8 dock.