What Today's Coders Don't Know and Why It Matters

jfruhlinger writes "Today's programmers have much more advanced languages and more forgiving hardware to play with — but it seems many have forgotten some of the lessons their predecessors picked up in a more resource-constrained era. Newer programmers are less adept at identifying hardware constraints and errors, developing thorough specifications before coding, and low-level skills like programming in assembly language. You never know when a seemingly obsolete skill will come in handy. For instance, Web developers who cut their teeth in the days of 14.4 Kbps modems have a leg up in writing apps for laggy wireless networks."

Comments

tl;dr

[itchythebear]

tl:dr - "Get off my lawn"

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[Anonymous Coward]

Paste

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Re:PEEK

[Anonymous Coward]

This is about programing, not gay sex

Lessons from the Old and Wise

[AirStyle]

I do agree with you. I'm new to programming myself, but I've always felt the need to learn more about the computer than just the high-level language. That's why I want to take up PERL. Apparently, there's still a strong Ruby community out there, so I might take that up as well. On top of that, I like to plan out my programs. I like to know exactly what it will do before I do it, which may require writing out the code first. I'm only two years into programming, so I still have a long way to go. I just want to make sure that what I do is very efficient so that all my future supervisor has to do is sit back and trust me.

In my day

[alostpacket]

we had to code uphill in 10 feet of snow on an abacus using roman numerals.

Re:those young whippersnappers

[billcopc]

That lib requires cooperative event handling in the kid class. I much prefer the longer, but deterministic form:

if ( $myLawn->getContents()->filter({type: kid})->count() > 0 ) {
    $myShotgun = new Shotgun()
    $myShotgun->loadAmmo();
    $myLawn->getOwner()->wieldObject($myShotgun);
    for( $i = 5; $i>0; $i--) { sleep(1000); }
    while ( $myLawn->getContents()->filter({type: kid})->count() > 0 ) {
        $myShotgun->fire();
    }
}

One question...

[MachDelta]

How the fuck do you forget something you were never taught in the first place?

This article should really read: "Crotchety old programmers fail to pass on tricks of the trade, then complain anyways"

Re:those young whippersnappers

[maxwell demon]

No, it clearly demands a combination of the observer pattern with the command pattern: You observe your lawn, and if you see kids, you command them to get off it.