-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Saturday 03 March 2007 18:10, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote: > On 03-Mar-07, at 5:35 PM, quasi wrote: > > dig this. I can do inaccurate pointer manipulation in C. I can > > exceed array boundaries in C. So C sux right, by you logic ? > > It is funny how "safe" stuff and crappy programmers somehow end > > up together. > > precisely my point. The vast majority of programmers in this > country are crappy programmers - maybe due to the education system > or maybe due to the climate. So how do you get good code out of > them? certainly not by letting them loose to code in C or php (or > java or perl, for that matter) - you do it by getting them to learn > the safe languages like python or pascal. Then let the good ones go > further into unknown territory. And then there would be less crappy > code in the world.
That's so... wrong. You don't teach programmers safe programming languages, you teach them safe programming. You don't teach programmers decent indentation by forcing them to use a language that enforces indentation, you just teach them decent indentation. You don't teach programmers the MVC paradigm by forcing them to use systems that enforce MVC, you just keep hitting them over the head until they do MVC properly. > Open source is all about getting non-professionals getting their > hands dirty in delving into code. And this is not going to be > productive as long as they are pointed to php, java, C, Visual > Basic etc etc. Is there some reasoning behind that statement, or are you just saying that because you believe Python should be used for everything from navigating the space shuttle to wiping your behind after going to the toilet? > This advice is not meant, as I have said before, for high level > hackers, it is advice for the general run of the mill 'crappy' > programmer, who, if well versed in the disciplines enforced by safe > languages, may turn out to be not-so-crappy. And that is why pascal > was such an excellent teaching/beginners language, because it didnt > have pointers at all - to do inaccurate pointer manipulation. Once again, using language to enforce paradigms is a Bad Idea. Paradigms and techniques should be taught independent of language, otherwise programmers don't know right from wrong. Sure, they'll be great coders in the stilted and restricted language they have been taught, but put them in any other environment and they'll be worse than useless. > You may be fortunate enought to be in an environment where there > are nothing but competent and excellent programmers - I, on the > other hand, find it difficult to believe that there are very many > such environments in this country. So i would say - avoid php, C > and java like plague, try perl if you are comfortable with it - > other wise stick to python or ruby. I'd say learn secure programming and MVC, learn proper indentation, learn documentation and commenting. Of course, that doesn't mean that you start off with a language that was DESIGNED to break MVC, so PHP sucks anyway. Regards, - -- Raju - -- Raj Mathur [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://kandalaya.org/ GPG: 78D4 FC67 367F 40E2 0DD5 0FEF C968 D0EF CC68 D17F It is the mind that moves -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFF6aS6yWjQ78xo0X8RAh7MAJ0b/yPLWoBJZaS9e4y0qBUjiwlpkwCfeP4Z IwoED7iTE8CzJj756CHUnSU= =xrR1 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers
