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From: jon@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (Jonathan P. Leech)
Newsgroups: net.cse
Subject: Re: various recently-discussed topics (learning languages)
Message-ID: <269@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Date: Tue, 18-Mar-86 06:07:27 EST
Article-I.D.: cit-vax.269
Posted: Tue Mar 18 06:07:27 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 21-Mar-86 05:27:40 EST
References: <1092@burl.UUCP> <1093@burl.UUCP> <117@andromeda.UUCP> <1549@gitpyr.UUCP>
Reply-To: jon@cit-vax.UUCP (Jonathan P. Leech)
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Organization: California Institute of Technology
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In article <1549@gitpyr.UUCP> chen@gitpyr.UUCP (Ray Chen) writes:
>
>By the second year, a CS major had better realize that there's more to
>CS than just "learning languages".  I agree with Curtis.  CS people
>should be able to learn languages on their own.  This is because
>   ...
>The one time students might need help learning a language is when the
>language embodies concepts the students haven't seen before.  Things
>like fp, and prolog probably fall into this category.	Then the
>students might need some help picking up the concepts (not the
>language).  After all, in the case of prolog say, how many
>undergraduates know what a backward-chaining, resolution theorem
>prover is?
>
>	Ray Chen
>	gatech!chen

    When I came to  Caltech,  the  only  language  I  knew  was  BASIC
(Dartmouth style). In a month I had K&R -  but	it  was  over  a  year
before I was truly comfortable with C.	Pointers?  Structures?	 These
were very difficult concepts to  struggle  through  on	my  own.   (It
didn't help that, while K&R  is  a  great  reference,  I  found  it  a
terrible tutorial).
    I have had similar problems with  smalltalk  and  prolog.  In  the
compiler class I took a few years back, first term we wrote  a	simple
FBAPP compiler in C or Mainsail (taking the entire  term  to  do  it).
Second term we spent 2 weeks on  prolog,  then	we  were  told	to  go
reimplement the compiler in prolog - in less than a  month.  That  was
NOT fun. Furthermore, I was struggling so much	with  the  details  of
getting the bloody compiler working that I missed out  on  fundamental
things about the language which would have been MUCH more valuable  to
know about initially.

    -- Jon Leech (jon@csvax.caltech.edu || ...seismo!cit-vax!jon)
    __@/