Everyone should program, or Programming is Hard? Both!
Mark Chu-Carroll explains the nature of computer programming in response to the general criticism that programming is difficult because it requires people to understand too much about how computers work. That’s not a great summary, so I’ll encourage you to just click on the link and read the article instead.
October 9, 2012 at 3:46 pm
This is a great example of two people that, put together in a room, would make magic, but instead are butting heads over the interwebs.
Their points aren’t in opposition: on the contrary. Mark talks of the complexity of programs, or symbolic complexity. Bret Victor, albeit with typical designer smugness (although he’s inarguably earned it), has shot off at a slight tangent and shown us what programming interfaces should really look like, how all kinds of stuff can be surfaced in a really elegant way, but doesn’t actually talk about learning or teaching programming much, i.e. the construction of the mind-set that can think through the mechanics of what you’re trying to build that programmers need.
They’re talking past each other. Put them in a room together, force them to work together, and they would make truly magical things.