81–90 of 200 posts
Looks like there is a Command Prompt executable for windows, but man, it is not easy to find or use for beginners. Hell, I'm still a little confused about how to actually interface with it, (although I am far from an expert on anything).
Excellent how this problem is continuously attempted to be solved. As a wannabe programmer, one thing I always lacked from these sites was the ability to somehow see my code live. I.e. it's fun to write html and css on codecademy or python from LPTHW or whatever but how on earth do I get it on the web or assembled into .app? In actuality, the complexity that surrounds DNS providers, server apps (or whatever you call…
>In actuality, the complexity that surrounds DNS providers, server apps (or whatever you call filezilla etc), server providers (here i mean heroku, AWS, Cloudflare etc), those weird githubs and repos that people chat about etc etc, is way more deterring than actually learning what a "class" is. That stuff is 80% of practical software engineering. The other 20% is communicating with other people. If you want to be goo…
Also, I feel we are talking about students quite a few steps below the stage where engineer vs. academia discussions become relevant.
See, companies - I think - need more technology people. And the pool of technology people is limited. The laws of supply and demand say that limited supply and increased demand will drive up the cost.
This is great for individuals, but a losing proposition for companies unless they have limitless resources.
The one thing that Starter League, Code Academy and every other site is that they teach individuals the real rudimentary elements of programming. And while vital, these are not a substitute for battle hardened experiences of crappy code, terrible mistakes or the ability to work as an apprentice.
I think it's more incumbent on organizations to figure out how to build talent from within which is really a more holistic and basically an amalgamation of everything.
- Find motivated individuals. - Validate that they have the skills to be an apprentice. - Accept that they're a beginner and commit to training them. - Learn their strengths and weaknesses and tailor a development plan for them. - Promote the shit out of them and make them your next generation of software, test and system engineers. - When they eventually leave - say to yourself 'Mission Accomplished' and hopefully rely on a talent pipeline.
I don't know if this is a teaching hospital methodology or developmental leagues in sports. It's probably somewhere in-between.
So these sites are great. The organizations are great. But transforming people into functional experts in the field can only come about with BOTH training and experience. I feel like Exercism only deals with the training aspect, not the experience aspect.
My $.02.
Excellent how this problem is continuously attempted to be solved. As a wannabe programmer, one thing I always lacked from these sites was the ability to somehow see my code live. I.e. it's fun to write html and css on codecademy or python from LPTHW or whatever but how on earth do I get it on the web or assembled into .app? In actuality, the complexity that surrounds DNS providers, server apps (or whatever you call…
>In actuality, the complexity that surrounds DNS providers, server apps (or whatever you call filezilla etc), server providers (here i mean heroku, AWS, Cloudflare etc), those weird githubs and repos that people chat about etc etc, is way more deterring than actually learning what a "class" is. That stuff is 80% of practical software engineering. The other 20% is communicating with other people. If you want to be goo…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>In actuality, the complexity that surrounds DNS providers, server apps (or whatever you call filezilla etc), server providers (here i mean heroku, AWS, Cloudflare etc), those weird githubs and repos that people chat about etc etc, is way more deterring than actually learning what a "class" is. That stuff is 80% of practical software engineering. The other 20% is communicating with other people. If you want to be goo…
Exactly! If 80% of practical software engineering is what i described above, then how come no one is teaching it! Also, I feel we are talking about students quite a few steps below the stage where engineer vs. academia discussions become relevant.
The comment about academia was a bit silly, true. I was trying to say that it's the only place where you can have the luxury of thinking about "pure" programming as a primary concern.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And this is why I always use PHP as an introductory language if I have to teach web dev; the setup part is much more straightforward than it is for Rails/Django/etc., and you don't have to spend a ton of time teaching dozens of concepts (MVC, routes, templating, git, unit tests, ORMs, etc.) before the students can have mini web apps written. Some programmers balk at the idea of teaching PHP with plain HTML/CSS instea…
Flask. Flask Flask Flask. It's well-documented, in Python, and you can push it to Heroku easy as pie. You can add things like templates (they're built in, and can be really simple) or just concatenate HTML the old-fashioned way. You can program very imperatively and work up to abstractions. It's very friendly. I haven't seen it used as an introductory "language" but I feel like it would work well.
Does that apply to you?
Without a reason to attract (relative) experts beyond philanthropy I think there's a risk that a ballooning amateur/expert ratio could soon cripple this, as happened to the way Matasano Crypto Challenges used to be run. I hate to be critical as I like the idea, and obviously there's some utility in it for experts as it is but it's much, much less so than for amateurs, and there's no reason to think that this imbalanc…
But when I went through the Ruby track (a language I'm already quite proficient at), I got almost no feedback, helpful or otherwise. Some of my entries would get one or two "thumbs up"s, but no comments, and most got no responses at all. Now that I've got a pretty good grasp on Go, my last couple of exercises there have started to follow the same trend.
As someone who has taught himself how to program - badly at times - I applaud these kinds of efforts, but I wonder if they're subverting the actual problem. See, companies - I think - need more technology people. And the pool of technology people is limited. The laws of supply and demand say that limited supply and increased demand will drive up the cost. This is great for individuals, but a losing proposition for co…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wouldn't worry too much about coding interview questions, especially if you're looking to just enter the profession. The most important aspects are showing a willingness to learn and an ability to think critically about problems.
Exactly. My previous comment may have been misleading. I don't think it's imperative to have a github account or a showcase of your work (it definitely would not hurt). I only have one public github project and I'm not exactly proud of it. I normally start all of my interviews by trying to engage in a conversation about programming topics. But as most of the people I interview have little experience outside of Java a…
As someone who has taught himself how to program - badly at times - I applaud these kinds of efforts, but I wonder if they're subverting the actual problem. See, companies - I think - need more technology people. And the pool of technology people is limited. The laws of supply and demand say that limited supply and increased demand will drive up the cost. This is great for individuals, but a losing proposition for co…