From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Received: by 2002:a6b:2306:: with SMTP id j6-v6mr6538689ioj.51.1531709189975; Sun, 15 Jul 2018 19:46:29 -0700 (PDT) X-Received: by 2002:aca:c6ca:: with SMTP id w193-v6mr3475044oif.1.1531709189732; Sun, 15 Jul 2018 19:46:29 -0700 (PDT) Path: eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!reader02.eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.uzoreto.com!weretis.net!feeder6.news.weretis.net!feeder.usenetexpress.com!feeder-in1.iad1.usenetexpress.com!border1.nntp.dca1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!d7-v6no4871677itj.0!news-out.google.com!l67-v6ni5259itl.0!nntp.google.com!g2-v6no4861290itf.0!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Date: Sun, 15 Jul 2018 19:46:29 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <0001HW.20FC05B4019F60EC700007BBE2CF@news.individual.net> Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com; posting-host=47.185.195.62; posting-account=zwxLlwoAAAChLBU7oraRzNDnqQYkYbpo NNTP-Posting-Host: 47.185.195.62 References: <1d3743b1-1a36-429d-92c7-9ae0e7c16e63@googlegroups.com> <87fu0m7ak0.fsf@nightsong.com> <6febe5d6-0339-4da5-afe5-9af4e2255597@googlegroups.com> <0001HW.20FC05B4019F60EC700007BBE2CF@news.individual.net> User-Agent: G2/1.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 Message-ID: <74a7b743-f904-4053-ac0f-7de8ade41369@googlegroups.com> Subject: Re: Ada: A beginners experience From: "Dan'l Miller" Injection-Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2018 02:46:29 +0000 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Xref: reader02.eternal-september.org comp.lang.ada:53836 Date: 2018-07-15T19:46:29-07:00 List-Id: On Sunday, July 15, 2018 at 5:44:06 PM UTC-5, Bill Findlay wrote: > On 14 Jul 2018, Jere wrote > (in article<6febe5d6-0339-4da5-afe5-9af4e2255597@googlegroups.com>): >=20 > > On Friday, July 13, 2018 at 11:36:51 PM UTC-4, Paul Rubin wrote: > > > This won't be a popular viewpoint here but IMHO Ada isn't a great cho= ice > > > as a first language. [...] > > > > [...] The type system (the big draw for me to Ada) is actually very str= eamlined. [...] > > > > None of this is beginner friendly though obviously. >=20 > I disagree very strongly with the idea that Ada is not a good beginners= =20 > language, and I > do so as a result of the experience of introducing an Ada-based CS1 cours= e in=20 > 1996. >=20 > Most of its advanced features will never arise in such a course, and the = good=20 > design > of Ada means that beginners are very unlikely to stumble upon them by=20 > mistake. >=20 > The Ada course replaced one based on Pascal, and the improvement in outco= mes > was clear at an early stage. Ada is easier for beginners than Pascal, bec= ause=20 > its > syntax and semantics are more consistent. In fact, it's just amuch better= =20 > language. >=20 > It was interesting to stand in the lab and watch Ada-based and Pascal-bas= ed=20 > beginners > working side by side. One day, about week 6 of term, the Ada studentshad= =20 > nearly all > successfully written a program that 2-D animated balls bouncing around in= a=20 > box. > The Pascalstudents were grappling, mostly unsuccessfully, with a trivial= =20 > text-based > read-process-output loop. >=20 > --=20 > Bill Findlay It seems that this result could have and should have been the subject of sc= ientific studies on first-programming-language acquisition (or at least as = much as incoming freshmen approximate that, eliding any exposure in high sc= hool). Pascal versus Ada versus C should have been quite the empirically-o= bservable comparison during the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s. And t= hen Java versus Ada versus Python should have been quite the empirically-o= bservable comparison from the latter Nineties through the latter Naughties/= Aughties. Mechanisms of, facilitators for, and impediments to first and second langua= ge acquisition has always been a primary scientific research area in natura= l-language linguistics, certainly since Jean Piaget or Noam Chomsky. Our f= ield should do the same, if for no other reason than to separate the men* f= rom the boys** among programming languages that shape the way a programmer = thinks for good or ill, perhaps actually fulfilling the Sapir-Whorf hypothe= sis in programming & software design: one's conceptions & mental model are= shaped by the programming language in which one thinks design thoughts men= tally. * Ada, perhaps Rust, perhaps OCaml or Haskell ** C, C++, all the =E2=80=98This time for sure=E2=80=99 Bullwinkle-hat-tric= k C-done-right/C++-done-right languages (e.g., Java, J++, C#, Objective-C, = Swift, Go), all the Algol-but-slightly-different languages (e.g., Pascal, R= uby, Lua), PL/I