Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#41

Post by danso » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 5:50 PM UTC

stormbrew wrote: post #25

danso wrote: post #14

Ironically, I sometimes fear Apple would be the harbinger of programming's death, what with how much can be done via consumer-friendly app and touch-screens. It didn't help hearing about OSX becoming macOS, which would be well in line with a dystopian future in which the only people who need to know about plaintext and file systems are the full-time Apple programmers. But this sounds like a great initiative...and als…

Can you expand on why you thought the OSX -> macOS change would lead to anything in particular like that? I don't really understand how.

Sorry, I don't have much reasoning on the specifics of OSX to macOS as they've been recently revealed, just the general skepticism that one operating system could achieve the best of both systems...in the same way that Windows 8.1, in my limited usage, was a fairly compromised experience. But I'm saying that as someone who can't imagine how skilled engineering could satisfactory thread the needle...and I'm giving short shrift to the potential greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts experience of a combined touch-and-desktop experience that perhaps a later iteration of Surface Book will achieve.

Mostly I'm bitter that not only can I not memeorize any of the 3+ finger gestures on iOS, I don't even know how customize/deactivate them, and I have a sneaking suspicion that more such touch magic will be part of the desktop experience.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#42

Post by draw_down » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 5:50 PM UTC

s3r3nity wrote: post #2

It seems like a lot of folks don't give Tim Cook enough credit in the post-Steve Jobs world for a lot of the philanthropic work Apple has done for education (as well as for the LGBTQ community.) Kudos to them for this initiative - and I'll be excited if this expands to adults at some point.

I wouldn't really call it philanthropic. Tech companies do this sort of stuff because of labor costs.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#43

Post by wwweston » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 5:52 PM UTC

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #16

dublinben wrote: post #3

I don't think it's necessarily fair to call this program "philanthropic." It's teaching kids how to use proprietary and commercial software, like iMovie, iBooks, and Tynker, when completely free alternatives exist like Blender and Scratch. This is essentially building a new generation of future Apple customers.

Yeah, it's a shame the skills you get from learning how to program on one platform don't translate to any other platform.

The industry would do well to better absorb the underlying point here (seriously, people, if Emeralds on Trails was really that great of an abstraction, a decent QIQ programmer with Orchestra framework experience would probably be able to pick up the important bits in the time an Emerald dev would be learning the domain specific portions of the app). But unfortunately, there are still costs to switching platforms and if you want to learn about or do anything other than learn new platforms, there's a limit to how much of that you can do.

And since we're talking about Apple here, it seems pretty safe to say that those costs are going to be higher than, say, a shift between Ruby and Python.

A language whose current practical use and reason for existence is entirely about developing for a single platform owned by an entity that has repeatedly demonstrated an indifference (or outright hostility) to outside use is not a language I'll likely use as an early one for learners.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#44

Post by throwanem » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 5:58 PM UTC

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #17

danso wrote: post #14

Ironically, I sometimes fear Apple would be the harbinger of programming's death, what with how much can be done via consumer-friendly app and touch-screens. It didn't help hearing about OSX becoming macOS, which would be well in line with a dystopian future in which the only people who need to know about plaintext and file systems are the full-time Apple programmers. But this sounds like a great initiative...and als…

I think the invention of the GUI killed the dream of mainstream programming. If computers had to be interacted with in ways that resembled programming - like a UNIX prompt - then people would be more used to the way computers actually work, with functions and parameters instead of icons and settings menus. I really hope that raspberry PI gets more mainstream appeal as time goes on. I fear the separation between coder…

> If computers had to be interacted with in ways that resembled programming - like a UNIX prompt - then people would be more used to the way computers actually work, with functions and parameters instead of icons and settings menus.

Yes. That's exactly how it would be, for whatever small fraction of current computer users were able and willing to adapt to that paradigm.

You're absolutely right about the separation between people who understand how computers work and people who only use them. Your second sentence in this comment is a brilliant example of the "echo-chamber wizard" school.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#45

Post by jshevek » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #32

I took my kid to one of these last year. It was fairly useless. They drag around little action-icons into a list to make an animated character move around and do stuff. My 11-year-old was bored stiff. Edit: PS the Apple Store employee who ran this thing (he was a very nice guy) admitted he had zero coding experience himself

Yes, given the level of competence of the staff at Apple stores, it seems unlikely there could be a worthwhile coding camp at that venue. Apple would need to bring in some much higher caliber people.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#46

Post by radlad » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

danso wrote: post #41

stormbrew wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you expand on why you thought the OSX -> macOS change would lead to anything in particular like that? I don't really understand how.

Sorry, I don't have much reasoning on the specifics of OSX to macOS as they've been recently revealed, just the general skepticism that one operating system could achieve the best of both systems...in the same way that Windows 8.1, in my limited usage, was a fairly compromised experience. But I'm saying that as someone who can't imagine how skilled engineering could satisfactory thread the needle...and I'm giving sho…

I don't think macOS is targeting touch screens -- and it's not a combination of OSX and iOS. It's simply a renaming of the OSX system.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#47

Post by sangnoir » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:10 PM UTC

I find this program ironic since Apple locks down iDevices pretty hard - their App Store rules prohibit coding[1] on iPhones & iPads. If anyone were to attempt to make an interpreter/port Scratch or Python to iOS, the app would not be approved.

1. §3.3.2 An Application may not download or install executable code. Interpreted code may only be used in an Application if all scripts, code and interpreters are packaged in the Application and not downloaded.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#48

Post by rhinoceraptor » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:10 PM UTC

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #17

danso wrote: post #14

Ironically, I sometimes fear Apple would be the harbinger of programming's death, what with how much can be done via consumer-friendly app and touch-screens. It didn't help hearing about OSX becoming macOS, which would be well in line with a dystopian future in which the only people who need to know about plaintext and file systems are the full-time Apple programmers. But this sounds like a great initiative...and als…

I think the invention of the GUI killed the dream of mainstream programming. If computers had to be interacted with in ways that resembled programming - like a UNIX prompt - then people would be more used to the way computers actually work, with functions and parameters instead of icons and settings menus. I really hope that raspberry PI gets more mainstream appeal as time goes on. I fear the separation between coder…

This seems like a really elitist attitude. I like windows and buttons and menus. I also really like the command line, my development environment is a fullscreen terminal window.

Programming nowadays is easier than ever to get into. All you need is a computer, an internet connection, and the drive to learn.

If you bought a car in the early 20th century, you had to know how to work on it. Now, that's not that case.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#49

Post by jshevek » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:11 PM UTC

dublinben wrote: post #3

I don't think it's necessarily fair to call this program "philanthropic." It's teaching kids how to use proprietary and commercial software, like iMovie, iBooks, and Tynker, when completely free alternatives exist like Blender and Scratch. This is essentially building a new generation of future Apple customers.

Yes, absolutely. There is nothing philanthropic about what apple is doing, just like there is nothing philanthropic about Google's efforts to bring effective, low cost computers into schools.

Both companies are fully aware of what they stand to gain in the years to come by familiarizing young people with the corporation's own technology.

Re: Apple launches coding camps for kids in its retail stores

#50

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jun 21, 2016, 6:12 PM UTC

wwweston wrote: post #43

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it's a shame the skills you get from learning how to program on one platform don't translate to any other platform.

The industry would do well to better absorb the underlying point here (seriously, people, if Emeralds on Trails was really that great of an abstraction, a decent QIQ programmer with Orchestra framework experience would probably be able to pick up the important bits in the time an Emerald dev would be learning the domain specific portions of the app). But unfortunately, there are still costs to switching platforms and…

[deleted]