On Wed, May 24, 2006 at 05:33:15PM +1000, david wrote: > Is there any interest in a group of non-coders who want to learn? I've > had several false starts at learning Perl/Python/PHP/bash but I never > keep it up to because: > * I'm not going to school, > * I don't have lots of time on my hands
These two seem related somehow... <grin> > I for one have some projects that I'd love to code, but they need some > reasonably advanced skills that won't happen if I don't stick to it. That's one of the hardest things about programming -- the stuff you can do for the first month or two are completely trivial and useless (well, not always, but it often seems that way). > Perhaps there is some interest in a SIG for newbie coders? So that we > aren't intimidated by the bottomless talent of the sluggers? ;-) Perhaps > even get some HELP ;-) This is a tricky problem. Yes, a group of new starters, with a bit of experience, working together cooperatively, could probably help each other out. There's two tricks there -- getting experienced help willing to put in a *lot* of time to help out some newbies, but more importantly, finding a group of people who can meet at a common time and place on a regular basis to code things and support each other. It's a pretty good idea, though. In fact, it's such a good idea that I'll make a commitment -- if at least 5[1] new programmers[2], who are interested in learning Ruby[3], can identify a common time (weekly)[4] and place[5] and will commit to showing up for at least 6 weeks (and putting in some time between sessions), I'll provide an evening a week of group and one-on-one help to that group for at least that 6 weeks, with the intention to keep going as long as the group does. So, find some people, and organise a time and place amongst yourselves. Send me the proposed time and place, and the list of people (including contact details, a brief description of what they might want to code, their computers background, and why they want to learn to program) and we'll kick it off. Anyone else who wants to mentor Ruby (or start up a competing scheme in a different language <grin>) is of course also welcome. - Matt [1] The minimum is to ensure there's a reasonable demand, and to give us a decent chance of a group over time. I'd say that I'll be able to help no more than about 10 people in a group, but if everyone's willing to accept that there might be less help, I'll give a larger group a go. Note that "oh, I might be in it if it gets going" doesn't count -- the 5 people need to be "yes, I will definitely be there at this date and time". If somebody says 'yes' and then doesn't turn up at the first meeting, the whole thing is off. [2] "New" defined as being "has never put together a reasonably practical software project in any language". If you know another language well enough to build an application, or contribute non-trivial patches to an OSS project, I'm sorry, this isn't going to be for you. [3] Because it's my favourite language, and because it's actually really easy to learn. [4] At least a 3 hour block of time. It needs to be at least weekly, so that there's regular feedback amongst the group. More than weekly will probably be too much for me to handle. I'd prefer a weeknight other than Friday (SLUG meetings, doncha know). [5] Needs to somewhere either pretty close to my house (Bankstown/Liverpool area) or somewhere I can get to via public transport (East Hills/Airport line or North Shore line). There'll really need to be a whiteboard and preferably a few desktops for people who don't have laptops surgically implanted like I do. A data projector would be *very* handy too, if it can be swung. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
