It is not only the violin that shapes the violinist, we are all shaped by the tools we train ourselves to use, and in this respect programming languages have a devious influence: they shape our thinking habits. This circumstance makes the choice of first programming language so important.
Austin, 12 April 2001
Edsger W.Dijkstra
To the Budget Council concerning Haskell
This is interesting, although people often need quick feedback when learning something new (especially when learning on their own) and trying to run a program and getting immediate feedback will keep them moving forward. Perhaps reading these alongside learning would be a good mix
It's not universally popular with learners given their general impatience to get going and the common assumption that the skill of designing programs can be acquired as a byproduct of learning a programming language.
Obviously this group of educators and researchers believe that starting with a "commercial" language can have downsides for many - and students often only appreciate this after years of practice and learning languages across multiple paradigms (even when moving from imperative to relational).
Perhaps that is the wrong question to ask:
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This is interesting, although people often need quick feedback when learning something new (especially when learning on their own) and trying to run a program and getting immediate feedback will keep them moving forward. Perhaps reading these alongside learning would be a good mix
It's not universally popular with learners given their general impatience to get going and the common assumption that the skill of designing programs can be acquired as a byproduct of learning a programming language.
Obviously this group of educators and researchers believe that starting with a "commercial" language can have downsides for many - and students often only appreciate this after years of practice and learning languages across multiple paradigms (even when moving from imperative to relational).
FYI: