Date: 03 Jul 1998 12:43:49 +0200 From: smoergrd@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com (Dag-Erling Coidan Smørgrav) To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> Cc: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Dag-Erling_Coidan_Sm=F8rgrav?= <smoergrd@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com>, Eivind Eklund <eivind@yes.no>, FreeBSD Chat <chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Beginning user's OS (was: Here is a really odd question!!!) Message-ID: <rx4k95vgqoq.fsf@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com> In-Reply-To: Greg Lehey's message of Fri, 3 Jul 1998 19:39:12 %2B0930 References: <19980703010915.6825.qmail@hotmail.com> <19980703124514.H358@freebie.lemis.com> <19980703022310.B4457@zappo> <rx4n2ar1ja4.fsf@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com> <19980703111031.39367@follo.net> <rx4ogv7gsne.fsf@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com> <19980703193912.M358@freebie.lemis.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> writes: > On Friday, 3 July 1998 at 12:01:25 +0200, Dag-Erling Coidan Smørgrav wrote: > > Eivind Eklund <eivind@yes.no> writes: > >> Hey! This is cool! The author of the language-implementation the > >> local univeristy uses to teach programming (they use Simula, telling > >> users to get cim for homework) is using TCL to teach programming! > >> *large and evil grin* > > What the hell is that grin for? Would *you* teach an eleven-year old > > to program with a compiled language? Of course you wouldn't. You'd > > choose an interpreted language where subtle typos don't shoot your > > leg off. > To be fair, I agree with Eivind. If this guy is so convinced about > his language, he'll write an interpreter. And if you can shoot your > leg off with Simula at age 11, you can still crash a plane with it at > age 33. (Not that I have had much to do with Simula in the last 20 > years. Which version is this?) I think there's a slight misunderstanding here. Sverre Johansen does not teach programming at the University of Oslo. Neither does he have any influence on the choice of language in the introductory programming courses. His involvment with Simula consists mostly of having written a compiler as part of his Master's thesis. He continues to maintain cim while working on his PhD and teaching a post-grad compiler theory course, but it is by no means his primary occupation. For the record, the Department of Informatics is planning to switch to Java as primary teaching language. This is generally regarded as a bad move by anybody who knows his way around a compiler. The decision was based more on political than on techincal arguments, and would probably not have been made had not Prof. Kirkerud been incapacitated since last december. Bjørns absence, and the ascension of Jens Kaasbøll to the position of teaching coordinator¹ has tilted the scale in favor of the Systems Development group, who IMNSHO should never, ever be allowed to have any say in such matters. These are the people who are teaching students that programmers and other assorted Computer Scientists are evil people who are permanently trying to belittle and dominate innocent users (e.g. Systems Developers), and that although they have their uses (after all, Microsoft has to get their engineers from *somewhere*) they must be reined in, controlled and closely supervised lest they put everybody except themselves out of a job. BTW, it might prove interesting to take that last sentence and replace every occurrence of "programmer" and "Computer Scientist" with "landowner" and "Capitalist", and "user" and "Systems Developer" with "laborer" and "Socialist". The result might be less of a surprise if you know that the SD department has been headed for many, many years by Kristen Nygård, renowned Labor politician and anti-EU combatant (and incidentially, co-inventor of Simula - small world, huh?) Can you spell academentia? DES (CS, dammit, *C* *S*) -- Dag-Erling Smørgrav - smoergrd@oslo.geco-prakla.slb.com ¹ "Undervisningsleder" - I couldn't find a better translation. BTW, Prof. Bjørn Kirkerud passed away on June 20th, the victim of a rapidly growing brain tumor. He will be sorely missed... :( To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?rx4k95vgqoq.fsf>