Harvey - I agree with much of what you say here - it is a recurring topic in NYCJUG meetings. But, not Powerpoint - FOR THE LOVE OF GOD - NOT POWERPOINT!
Sorry about that - I really don't like Powerpoint - it dumbs things down to the level of "nearly comatose". I just abandoned doing the slides for my talk in it and am just using a slideshow program to display .JPGs. Maybe the labs have a taint of old-fashionedness about them but they allow interaction with the J environment, which is crucial. The demos have the nice feature of showing you the script being run and allowing you to modify and re-run it. The basic problem is that it still requires you to work to learn and there is no getting around that. My hope is that we might at some point achieve a critical mass of cool demos that people will find the motivation to make the effort. Regards, Devon On Mon, Jun 1, 2009 at 12:08 AM, PackRat <[email protected]> wrote: > Raul Miller wrote: > > I think a better approach, for gathering information about new user > > issues, would involve observing lots of new users and asking them > > questions, when they encounter difficulties. > > As an elementary school teacher many years ago and as a relatively new > J user, I agree with you, Raul. > > Frankly, what bothered me most when I first encountered J (and still > does) is that the whole shebang is far too disorganized and "geeky" to > attract a popular following. New users simply MUST be able to find > information easily--in today's J environment, this is virtually > impossible. ... > (The > labs should be Powerpoint presentations or something, or some J coding > that produces a similar effect.) Or is there a subconscious desire NOT > to attract more people but to keep J "elite"? > ... -- Devon McCormick, CFA ^me^ at acm. org is my preferred e-mail ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
