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Hello All,
I want to add my 2c worth thoughts on this subject.
First let me state that I know some programming languages (practically,
I've written applications in all of them) - Fortran, Algol, Cobol,
C, Lisp (emacs, not CL) and about 10 various assemblers (again, with
practical experience). I don't refer to scripting languages (shell,
perl and even awk) as programming languages (although they share the
basic principles and I use them a lot).
I think the best language to teach young persons is Fortran. After a
VERY SHORT explanation of its principles and an example, a useful
program can be written. It takes much more time to achieve the same
level of usefulness with C.
I have two anecdotes to illustrate this point. I learned Fortran after
a lecture of 1 hour by the late Gidon Zwas (BTW, a great teacher) 34
years ago. I could write many programs that did real things (I used
it for the Physics lab reports) even before I read the CDC Fortran RM.
Few years ago my daughter and her boyfriend had to take a course in
computer programming (in the Technion) for their Chemistry degree.
They were offered either Fortran or C. My daughter took Fortran (I
must have influenced her a little), her boyfriend took C. I saw the
their homework. By my judgment the Fortran exercises were concerned
more with the algorithms involved, while the C ones were dealing
more with the technical staff (like the difference between chr[0]
and *chr).
My big point is: A first programming language should concentrate on
3 principals only:
1. Variables and assignment, i.e. a variable name is only a place
holder, and I = I + 2 change the value it the `I' place.
2. Translation of algorithms to statements (i.e. conditionals and
looping).
3. Use of (multi dimensioned) arrays.
All the rest (data structure, subroutines, structured programming,
data abstraction, etc.) are important but must come after the
comprehension of the above principles.
Ehud.
- --
Ehud Karni Tel: +972-3-7966-561 /"\
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