kenferry

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by kenferry 12y ago
> yet people are learning effectively from MOOCs Statistically speaking, they aren't, that's the problem. Completion rates with Coursera are ~5%. Some argue that many people don't _want_ to finish the courses, but this vie
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Silver: Use Swift with Android and .Net(remobjects.com)
2 points by kenferry 12y ago|0 comments
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by kenferry 12y ago
> I rarely even encounter people describing layouts in the way GSS appears to want me to code them. I don't think that's the case… think of how when you're dragging elements around in Keynote or Powerpoint, how you get gui
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by kenferry 12y ago
The author is maybe not aware that there's already a convenience form that doesn't require explicitly making an NSRegularExpression object. if name.rangeOfString("ski$", options: .RegularExpressionSearch).location
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by kenferry 12y ago
Thanks! It seems to be working quite well so far, but we're still very small, of course.
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by kenferry 12y ago
That structure is more or less what we're doing with our iPad app, Understudy, for SICP. If someone signs up for SICP, we pair them with another user a bit ahead, to talk to once a week. Once they're a ways in, they start leading
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by kenferry 12y ago
That's interesting - want to give your numbers? I would think, however, that any sort of reasonable minority calling it a "hostile work environment" would indicate a problem.
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by kenferry 13y ago
Ok, I'll chat anyway. :-) I implemented a linear programming solver for iOS in the form of Cocoa Auto Layout, and the app I'm working on now, http://understudyapp.com is kind of about mentoring (it does videochat with
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by kenferry 13y ago
I don't know an answer to your original question. Re: statistics and such though, I have heard very good things about http://www.indiana.edu/~kruschke/DoingBayesianDataAnalysis/ If you are interested in a Mat
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by kenferry 13y ago
The picture language is supported, BUT includes different primitive images. SICP uses 'wave' and 'rogers'. The package for racket includes only 'einstein'. FYI.
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by kenferry 13y ago
> Question - would you recommend working through SICP in Racket? Yes. I used DrRacket with Neil Van Dyke's SICP package http://www.neilvandyke.org/racket-sicp/ , and that's what we recommend. > What abo
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by kenferry 13y ago
> One, Is it possible for a user to "save" the session? Yup! Old sessions are basically saved as documents. > Two, the quality of written aspect, which is central to the "communication" idea is very poor in compari
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by kenferry 13y ago
As opposed to starting with the MS Surface? Well, I'd say the central theme is human connection, and then the question is what you need to make that work. All I can say is that the iPad's screen seems to be over the hump for this!
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by kenferry 13y ago
This is neither art nor note taking, it's communication. :-) It's visual anchoring and gesturing - after the call's over you don't end up looking back at what you did almost at all. We didn't know if the tech would
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by kenferry 13y ago
Sorry about that! The thing is, a tablet is very well suited to the whiteboard, and we find that the whiteboard _really_ helps for this kind of working collaboration. It makes it very natural to gesture and discuss visually. Understudy work
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by kenferry 13y ago
This one! http://www.neilvandyke.org/racket-sicp/ #lang planet neil/sicp
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by kenferry 13y ago
I do love IRC, but what Understudy gives you is a one-to-one relationship with another person who cares. It means that Thursday evening, when you're tired, it's easier to pick yourself up and work, because doing so gets you a _bet
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by kenferry 13y ago
At the moment, more trying to make things work well at least _somewhere_. :-) Would love to do Android, though.
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by kenferry 13y ago
The app looks like this when you launch it: https://www.dropbox.com/s/zmj9poc7nic7wzz/Homescreen%20Final... If you enroll in SICP, we find you someone to work with. (You can always just call someone you already kn
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Show HN: Learning SICP with Understudy(blog.understudyapp.com)
109 points by kenferry 13y ago|50 comments
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by kenferry 13y ago
Seems like a merger one can feel ok about.
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by kenferry 13y ago
This works great, with one caveat: the picture language in SICP has built-in primitive images such as "wave" and "rogers". The DrRacket SICP package has only one primitive image, "einstein".
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by kenferry 13y ago
I think that's true if your setup is symmetric. You and your friend have to go at the same pace, you get anxious about holding them up or coming off as dumb, etc. This is an asymmetric setup. You talk through whatever material the less
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by kenferry 13y ago
It doesn't really require any math… some exercises and examples do require math, but you can just skip them. The first chapter has a lot more of that than the rest. It's very much not essential. To give an example, the hardest mat
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by kenferry 13y ago
I do love IRC, but what Understudy gives you is a one-to-one relationship with another person who cares. It means that Thursday evening, when you're tired, it's easier to pick yourself up and work, because doing so gets you a _bet
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by kenferry 13y ago
> More seriously, is it because of the video-chat feature? Yes. :-) When people tutor kids, they make sure there's always another adult in the room. That's hard for us, so no kids.
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by kenferry 13y ago
Mostly because a tablet is very well suited to the whiteboard, and we find that the whiteboard _really_ helps for this kind of working collaboration. It makes it really easy to gesture and discuss visually. As far as iPad vs Android - that&
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by kenferry 13y ago
Yup, kinda! Except in a Ponzi scheme, value only flows down. Explaining something really straightens it out for yourself. Conversation isn't zero sum.
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by kenferry 13y ago
If folks are interested in having a person to talk to while doing SICP, we're doing it in the iPad app we released last Thursday. We were going to do a Show HN, but hey, HN's already talking SICP! Understudy: https://it
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by kenferry 13y ago
That sounds like a great project! Kind of like colorspace calibration for monitors applied to sound.

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