-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 8/29/10 20:32 , Kevin Wright wrote: > > > ... bottom line is that using Kojo and reading the Kojo doc teaches > you nothing about Scala. > > > > and this is the fundamental point of disagreement. > > Actually, it not only teaches you some Scala, but also come of the > Java API as well: > http://wiki.kogics.net/forum/t-229555/another-example-with-sq-and-dist-methods > I > must say I'm pretty much with Cedric. But indeed it's not that Cedric and others are right and Kevin and others are wrong. You're mostly discussing on different things. I've read the pdf about Kojo. Pretty neat. Indeed the DSL capabilities of Scala are a great thing, pretty neat and powerful, and I regret that Java can't do that much more than closures.
Given that, I think that the only correct statements that can be done are: 1. Students using Kojo are learning a subset of Scala. So it's not wrong that they are not learning Scala. But it's a subset. For instance, I don't see any trace of "pattern matching" in the whole PDF document. 2. I think we can assume they are enjoying Kojo 3. Surely, since they are using a subset of Scala they could be pushed to learn more of Scala. Kojo is a pretty smart idea to evangelize Scala, indeed. I think that we can all agree on these three points. Now, there's some implicit inferencing by Kevin: that those students that will go on expanding their knowledge of Scala will keep on liking it as they expand their knowledge of it. Consider this example: playing chess. I'm able to play chess in the sense that as I child I learned the basic rules (how the different pieces move). This is a subset of the game domain. Further parts of the game domain are strategies to win. Indeed "playing chess" does include at least some level of strategy - serious players will poo poo at you if you only can move pieces (and indeed, I don't think that I can really say "I can play chess"). I was saying that I can't deal with chess strategies: It's not the kind of thing that I've fun with: too cerebral. I really can't improve there. Thus, the fact that I found easy and even amusing to learn the basics of a thing did not imply that I liked the whole of it. Of course, I'm not asserting that all students will _not_ enjoy Scala as they learn more of it. That's why I'm not saying that Kevin is wrong. Give me a proof of that, and I'll believe that. If I understand well, nobody has got yet enough statistics to figure out, right? We'll wait and see. Personally, I think that only a minority of students will still enjoy keep on learning Scala - perhaps even Kevin, in his subconscious, as in his previous post he wrote "the more advanced students". :-) This objection of mine is perfectly coherent with my judgment of Scala being "powerful" and "complex". This means that if you only use a subset of Scala, you might be satisfied by the reduced power that you get, and you're not facing with all the complexity. In fact, I seem to have said in the past that I'd be curious to see a stripped down version of Scala. - -- Fabrizio Giudici - Java Architect, Project Manager Tidalwave s.a.s. - "We make Java work. Everywhere." java.net/blog/fabriziogiudici - www.tidalwave.it/people [email protected] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG/MacGPG2 v2.0.14 (Darwin) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/ iEYEARECAAYFAkx6sMMACgkQeDweFqgUGxfUQQCgkDD/qvES9PFzT67+/S5OStbE TkkAn0UVeaYLiE64HxPXIC4ilKy5w93f =H/1M -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
