Clearly there is a need for a less hostile programming environment.
Even tools for which there is a clear need (eg version control) have largely failed to make a dent. Despite the clear benefits, the vast majority of the world has chosen to remain illiterate. I would only point out that, emperically, that bar is too high. One might also argue that these tools are simple enough once you learn to use them. We still program like it’s 1960 because there are powerful path dependencies that incentivise pretending your space age computing machine is actually an 80 character tty. Most of these constraints though are the product not of deliberate choices but of historical accident.
There are probably dedicated apps that cover this particular example but we are more concerned with how an end-user would solve this kind of problem in general and the difficulties they will encounter along the way.Ī lot of the problems we will encounter seem unavoidable - they are forced on us by outside constraints. While this a simple program, it covers all the basics: data input, validation, error handling, calculation, presentation, communication, reactivity, scheduling, deployment etc. At the end of every month, tally up what each person owes and send the list to accounting. At 1200, gather up the replies and email the list to the catering company. So let’s put ourselves in the shoes of a smart but inexperienced end user trying to build, test and maintain a simple application.Īnon the intern is charged with managing lunch orders and quickly realises that their job could be done by a computer: Every day at 1000, send each employee an email with a link to a form where they can choose what they want for lunch. The first step in making programming easier is to be concious of what makes it hard. After years of repetition it fades into the background and is forgotten. Much of the pain in programming is taken for granted.
0 kommentar(er)
