Re: Programming?

["Robert G. Brown" <bob@xxxxxxx>]

>>>...my first language resembled most other programming
>>>languages.  It uses things like "if", "for", "print", and most other
>>>common programming statements.
>>Many of these keywords are forces into un-natural constructs, which makes it
>>harder for many novice programmers to pick up. ....
>Yes, "else if" logic can get more confusing, especially if 
>you start putting more "if"s inside your "else if"s.   :{)
>That's were a good "case" statement comes in handy.
I've seen those abused, too. and nested "case" stateents can cause people
as much grief.

APL does not have such machinery, and if you want to build it, you're going
to learn a lot about structured programming by so doing (actually, many
APL systems have block-structuring controls, with syntax checking at coding 
time, but the linquistic facility of APL minimizes their use).

That only one example, yet we ask novices to climb over a lot of this stuff 
when they learn how to program. To use these conventional languages intel-
ligently, you have to learn all of this typography and so on before you
can express your algorithm. This is great for machines, but tedious for many 
humans.

In order to express algorithms well, we often need to get away from the 
machinery. Once we understand some of the underlying stuff, we can get
back to the more mundane tasks or writing the code, perhaps in some 
"conventional" language.  Once we have the insight that can be gained from
an alternate view, a lot of the rest is mechanics and practice.

>APL is probably a good tool for some tasks. (not matter how obscure :)
Only as obscure as running factories, stock exchanges, and insurance 
companies. :)

>I've given my opinion on this subject, so I guess it's up to our new 
>programmer to sort this out and pick his first language.  

>Sorry we couldn't all agree on this and make the choice simple for you.
>Good luck!!!
You can't accuse us of not showing the group a choice, and alternate points
of view.

>P.S.  If you pick APL and have questions, I'll bet there is only 
>      one person on this mailing list that can help you.   :{)
Perhaps, but I think that someone will introduce you to others (and there
ARE other mailing lists) who will help as well.

                                                               Regards,
                                                              ---> RGB <---