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Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

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Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#21

Post by euroclydon »

jrockway wrote: post #16
euroclydon wrote: post #3

I really want to learn C, like he says. I get plenty done without knowing it, and I have few doubts I can continue to find decent work without knowing it, but I haven't been able to gain any traction when I try to learn it. I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer. If there…

So, if you're a web developer, you probably use Perl, Python, Ruby, or some similar language. Guess what, these are written in C(+). When you need to add or fix a feature, guess what language you use? (+) Yes, yes, programming languages are not written in anything. Their implementations are. I know you know what I mean.

I hear you, but adding or fixing a feature in Python/Ruby/Perl doesn't ever come up for me. Does it for you? Plus, I understand that much of the standard libraries are written in the high level language.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#22

Post by BrianHV »

euroclydon wrote: post #14
leon_ wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer Write a web app in C? ;) But yeah, in most cases C won't improve your productivity as a web developer. But it will certainly make you understand the computer better. So maybe start a recreational project in C? A command line utility, a demon, a music streaming server - something not really web-dev related.

Listening to you, I'm thinking about just reading the C books and nothing more. If C's usefulness to non-C-programmers is simply that it gives them greater understanding of how computers work, then reading might suffice.

I'd encourage you to write some code, too. There's a lot of intuition you gain by manipulating the bits that you can't get by reading. You may think you know what a pointer is, but until you've had to debug a double-free segfault or a memory leak, it's hard to understand the ramifications of the concept. The standard string handling functions look trivial in documentation, but when you actually use them you'll find yourself forgetting to add null bytes or not realizing that some of the functions mutate the string you're working on. I'd argue it's that process of figuring out how to make things work that gives you the famed understanding of how computers work.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#23

Post by elai »

euroclydon wrote: post #3

I really want to learn C, like he says. I get plenty done without knowing it, and I have few doubts I can continue to find decent work without knowing it, but I haven't been able to gain any traction when I try to learn it. I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer. If there…

Make an iPhone app to connect to your web apps? That way you'll have a need to use it, even if your mostly typing objective-c.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#24

Post by Homunculiheaded »

euroclydon wrote: post #3

I really want to learn C, like he says. I get plenty done without knowing it, and I have few doubts I can continue to find decent work without knowing it, but I haven't been able to gain any traction when I try to learn it. I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer. If there…

A great exercise for Web developers is to build a minimal web-server. You can choose your definition of 'minimal' but essentially it should receive some request and return a response (from and to a web browser). As a webdev I found even the very, very minimal web server in Land of Lisp to be really insightful to build. If you wanted to flesh out the actual handling of http verbs better that would be even more awesome. Minimal webservers should be the minimal lisps of web developers

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#25

Post by chrisaycock »

Every time you feel like you've made the world better by upvoting a story about injustice, you're just making yourself feel smug. Forget the upvotes... go work on making the world a better place.

He was writing about how stories of social injustice get a ton of upvotes, but nobody actually goes out and does anything to fix the situation. I'm sure there's a lesson here for HN.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#26

Post by makmanalp »

chrisaycock wrote: post #25

Every time you feel like you've made the world better by upvoting a story about injustice, you're just making yourself feel smug. Forget the upvotes... go work on making the world a better place. He was writing about how stories of social injustice get a ton of upvotes, but nobody actually goes out and does anything to fix the situation. I'm sure there's a lesson here for HN.

Aptly named "slacktivism" (I didn't coin that one).

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#27

Post by pclark »

chrisaycock wrote: post #25

Every time you feel like you've made the world better by upvoting a story about injustice, you're just making yourself feel smug. Forget the upvotes... go work on making the world a better place. He was writing about how stories of social injustice get a ton of upvotes, but nobody actually goes out and does anything to fix the situation. I'm sure there's a lesson here for HN.

Can anyone argue that the time spent upvoting a reddit story of injustice provides negative net value to the world?

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#28

Post by xentronium »

euroclydon wrote: post #3

I really want to learn C, like he says. I get plenty done without knowing it, and I have few doubts I can continue to find decent work without knowing it, but I haven't been able to gain any traction when I try to learn it. I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer. If there…

> I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer

Write a C-extension for infrastructure-level ruby gem if you're a rubyist, or fix a bug / add a feature in your favorite scripting language.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#29

Post by orijing »

euroclydon wrote: post #3

I really want to learn C, like he says. I get plenty done without knowing it, and I have few doubts I can continue to find decent work without knowing it, but I haven't been able to gain any traction when I try to learn it. I've got the books sitting front of me, and I've written some trivial visualizations of sorting algorithms using terminal output, but damn if I can find a way to use C as a web developer. If there…

You could try using C to solve some problems on Project Euler, or puzzles like Facebook Puzzles, or even past problems from Google Code Jams.

Re: Joel Spolsky is doing an IAmA on reddit

#30

Post by chrisaycock »

pclark wrote: post #27
chrisaycock wrote: post #25

Every time you feel like you've made the world better by upvoting a story about injustice, you're just making yourself feel smug. Forget the upvotes... go work on making the world a better place. He was writing about how stories of social injustice get a ton of upvotes, but nobody actually goes out and does anything to fix the situation. I'm sure there's a lesson here for HN.

Can anyone argue that the time spent upvoting a reddit story of injustice provides negative net value to the world?

If people felt they had "done something" with the upvote, why would they feel the need to intervene for real?

One of the negative consequences of social media in general is that it can lead to very casual and even cynical views of how we relate to one another. Thus, what was meant to bring people together can actually make them more emotionally distant. If I see a hundred stories of trouble in the world, why would I take action on even one of those troubles?

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