Is there anybody out there who still wants to learn programming by hand?
4 Boosts
0 Likes
@mttaggart I’m over 50 and never learned to code but recently have thought of learning Lua just for a laugh and to keep my brain fresh.
I've been programming for about 45 years, but I need to learn a new language just for the challenge. With age, it becomes harder and harder to keep the brain flexible, lively and open, but learning new stuff really helps.
@mttaggart Learning to program is learning a new way of thinking. I don’t know of any other mind skill that can do it all: Detail orientation. Clarity. Problem solving. Procedures. Functions. Communication. Timing. Simplification. Experimentation. Testing. So much more …but above all, logical thinking. We should teach it in first grade.
You program with your mind, not your hands.
@mttaggart Yes.
Using LLMs to write code feels like using Google translate to have a conversation with a tribal elder. Sure, a lot of words are being said, but I don't feel like I've understood much, and quite frankly I'm insulting everyone around me.
@mttaggart
anybody out there who wants to learn how to create fire by hand?
@mttaggart We program by 
around here
@mttaggart @drwho I been learning zig as an antidote to the llm stuff I have to do for work.
@donaldball @drwho I think I need to get on the Zig train
@mttaggart @drwho I don’t like all of the design choices, but I deeply respect the principled thought that seems to have gone into them.
@mttaggart That's how I've been learning Rust and Go. It's the most effective way for me to wrap my brain around the concepts
@mttaggart I’m still poking at the keyboard. Eyes are getting a little tired of extremely verbose reviews though.
@mttaggart Still very much prefer learning by hand here. It's been ages but I did like the "Learn Python the Hard Way" approach. Tying the motor patterns of typing the words felt helpful at the time, even though I feel like swapping between Python and JS regularly has me forgetting either's syntax more often than I'd like...
And it's still on my list to give Rust a proper go once I have the cycles for it.
@mttaggart hell yeah. Been learning a bit of Rust for quite some time. It's hard/unusual for me and I hardly have time, but I'll continue my baby steps.
@mttaggart always. Being doing this for 17 years professionally and want to keep learning.
@mttaggart I remember the web pages .... what was the name of the program? "Front Page" ? would make.
I hope there's room for secret nerd clubs to do it.
@mttaggart I have a handful of projects I want to start on but am stuck at the “which frameworks do I use?” and “how do I even set them up?” phase.
Even for simple work-related hacks. “Just point Claude at it.” Happy to (just to get past the boilerplate stage), but even that doesn’t answer all the questions I have.
Nor does it fill me with confidence that I won’t be stuck woth stupid architectural decisions I’ll have to work around.
My mind is full of algorithms and features. I got nowhere to put em.
@darthnull @mttaggart if it's an interactive sort of thing claude is gonna shunt you to gosh awful python + fastapi or daft node + express and (for either) bloated react + tailwind on the front * you'll regret both decisions at some point.
Tailwind lost so much revenue due to the LLMs that they're down to (I think) 1 full timer. I fear webawesome won't be around much longer. Svelte folks are also feeling it.
This is all by design too, and since LLMs cannot innovate, this is permahades tech.
@darthnull @mttaggart oh, & since i mentioned tailwind, i will take an opportunity for an "old man yells at cloud" rant.
i used a non-ai generated Astro blog theme for one of my sites and realized too late it relies on tailwind.
tdy, i finally carved out the 20-30 human minutes today to figure out which daft tailwind idiom was breaking <td align="right"> on my tables (the cascade is different depending on context). i'm gonna strip it down to just basic CSS in the next available hacking slot.
@hrbrmstr @darthnull Hell yeah. I've always really disliked the Tailwind approach. I'm the rare duck that prefers writing my own CSS.
@mttaggart @hrbrmstr Even a brief look at most sites’ CSS can be terrifying. So much bloat. It’s amazing anything works at all.
Sometimes I miss the simplicity of H1-H6 and OL and all that. An occasional HR. Just plain old structured documents.
They have played us for absolute fools….
@mttaggart
Doubtful these days. Fewer and fewer even hear of it now, so why learn?