[HN Gopher] A Data-Centric Introduction to Computing
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       A Data-Centric Introduction to Computing
        
       Author : RafelMri
       Score  : 101 points
       Date   : 2022-06-20 08:49 UTC (14 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (dcic-world.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (dcic-world.org)
        
       | wizofaus wrote:
       | Am I the only person who literally spent 45 seconds just trying
       | to figure out how to access whatever content was on that page?
       | (Including switching to desktop mode on my phone in case somehow
       | it had just been badly designed for small screen use...)
        
         | feet wrote:
         | I gave up in about 5, not wasting my time with that
        
       | wodenokoto wrote:
       | Looks like an interesting angle to data and computer science.
       | 
       | The authors build their own teaching language to accompany the
       | book, called pyret [1]
       | 
       | A cool feature of which is you can have tests as part of your
       | function definition.
       | 
       | [1] https://www.pyret.org/
        
       | bruce343434 wrote:
       | Is there an "unrolled" version of this book where I don't have to
       | click a button or link after every paragraph to read the next?
        
       | jackallis wrote:
       | people w/experience, how does this transfer to other languages
       | once you complete this?
       | 
       | Edit: generally, i would love for any text based or even MOOC
       | based courses to lay, out at the end, where does said student do
       | after finishing the course i.e. what courses the could
       | potentially take.
        
       | Rzor wrote:
       | How does this book compare to How to Design Programs?
        
         | newsoul wrote:
         | Check the appendix of the book. The authors have made a
         | comparison.
        
         | johnamata wrote:
         | see the author's take on both:
         | 
         | https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1478125799660261376.html
        
       | kingkongjaffa wrote:
       | I read https://www.pyret.org/pyret-code/ and I still think it's
       | strange to not just use python or some other language that's more
       | marketable.
       | 
       | Presumably most people learning to code are doing so in the hopes
       | of gainful employment at some point, so it's handy to learn a
       | language you can put on your resume to maybe get a job.
        
         | karanbhangui wrote:
         | Industrial languages and their syntax can be learned pretty
         | quickly once core computer science concepts have been grokked.
        
           | cloogshicer wrote:
           | I teach programming to complete beginners (adults) and I've
           | experienced the exact opposite. For a beginner, the
           | difficulty of learning a new language is really not to be
           | underestimated. The new syntax, small differences in
           | semantics here and there... it all adds up quickly and people
           | get confused and overwhelmed.
        
             | karanbhangui wrote:
             | All the more reason to use a purpose built teaching
             | language without the cruft and with minimally necessary
             | syntax, no?
        
               | cloogshicer wrote:
               | I disagree, I think it's more valuable to learn a
               | language that's "real" straight away, because even
               | teaching languages have a lot of details and intricacies,
               | and this way you only have to learn those once (at the
               | beginning).
               | 
               | I'm not saying the other way can't work though, I've just
               | experienced that this is easier.
        
       | rfrey wrote:
       | In case it doesn't jump out to someone (it didn't to me), one of
       | the authors (Shriram Krishnamurthi) is also an author of HtDP. I
       | cottoned onto this because in the appendix describing differences
       | with HtDP the authors describe ideas weaving back and forth
       | between the two books.
        
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       (page generated 2022-06-20 23:01 UTC)