[Courses] please reply with what kind of courses are you interested in

[Esme]

For what it's worth, a year or so ago, I was quite keen to laern Perl 
when I had the time. Since then, the seer number of available laguages, 
and the  arguments for and against each by those already using them  
have quite simply put me off the idea - how the heck is a nwbie to know 
whether or not they will be wasting their time learning  any particular 
language?   The fnal straw for me was in trying to find smthing simple 
enough that I could be assured of getting some kind of useful result 
whilst being interesting enough to, well, hold my interest.  When I 
asked quesions in various places regarding what I had in mind (a repeat 
of something I did on an Amiga years ago)  I received such contradictory 
and downright discouraging responses (amazingly, it appears that modern 
technology makes that prticular project harder to implement, rather than 
easier!) that I decided to give up.

The only stuff like programming of any kind I've been doing lately is 
the occasional use of the console for very minor tasks, and learning a 
bit of very basic SQL at work, so I can more quickly find bits of info 
in database tables where visual inspection using the SpeedSQL interface 
is impractical. I've just learnt about joins, and have only just 
finished a wee lesson using some simple ones.   But (a) I can see a 
clear use for it, (b) it's intelligible (well... those joins are more 
difficult in practice than in principle, but YKWIM) and (c) I'm not 
getting a lot of contradictory arguments over whether I should be 
learning that or something else.

For me to go  for any other kind of programming course, it will need to 
meet those same points.  Is there a clear use for it?  Does the language 
seem intelligible to me? And whilst I don;t mind seeing a short list of 
strengths and weaknesses, I really do NOT want arguments over whether I 
should belearning the ruddy thing at all, or to be told that some proble 
I've hit would b best handled by some other flipping language.

I would absolutely LOVE a kind of generalised "programming with Linux" 
course, which, if necessary, selects up to three languages (DEFINITELY 
no more than four)  that are relatively simple to grasp but that in 
conjunction, can get quite a bit of Useful Stuff done, with some 
interesting examples early on (Can I just say I loathe seeing "hello 
world"?!  This seems to be a sure sign that the language being taught is 
too esoteric for beginners and only used by its inventor plus chums or 
the l333t types - or otherwise by advanced programmers)).  Doesn't 
matter whether something else is better for the job, doesn't matter 
whether it's a bit slow or clunky compared to a "best" solution.  So C 
and Java are right out.  Something as readable and comprehensible as 
old-style BASIC - or that can be acually used in a wa that is as clear 
as that, a least.  At work, I sometimes find myself looking at 
ColdFusion code. I can't write the stuff and have no need to - but I CAN 
follow the logic and generally help pinpoint where a problem has arisen 
so the programmers can fix it.  And I'm sure if I had time to take a 
course in it that I could learn ColdFusion.   I want to see stuff like 
that.  Not esoteric strings of characters maipulating even more esoteric 
programming concepts.  Those can come later.  Ater all, I larnt to talk 
early on with phrases like "want biscuit!" and "no!" not "Excuse me, may 
Ihave a biscuit?" or "Thank you, but I do not want that"  "want 
biscuit!" gets the job done - and leads one on the way to the moe 
complex and elgant stuff...

Damn, I've soapboxed. Apologies, but I;ve found it really frustrating, 
having once been fairly good at the programing of the day (twenty years 
ago) to find myself nowadays unable to get wondrous things out of modern 
technology by my own efforts, rathr than using someone else's solution..

Esme

Mary wrote:

> On Fri, Oct 07, 2005, Steven Walker wrote:
>  
>
> >It was unfortunate that there was little response to the Perl course.
> >I have no idea if it was because there were no students or because
> >they found it so easy there were no questions to ask. Either way it
> >must have been disheartening for the tutor and less interesting for
> >the students.
> >    
> >
>
> As best I can remember, all programming courses have worked out that
> way. I can only imagine that it's just worked out that people who are
> motivated enough to do a course on programming here have also been
> motivated enough to teach themselves.
>
> -Mary
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