Slashdot Mirror
More Students Learn CS In 3 Days Than Past 100 Years
theodp writes "Code.org, backed by Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, boasts in a blog post that thanks to this week's Hour of Code, which featured a Blockly tutorial narrated by Gates and Zuckerberg, 'More students have participated in computer science in U.S. schools in the last three days than in the last 100 years.' Taking note of the impressive numbers being put up on the Hour of Code Leaderboards ('12,522,015 students have done the Hour of Code and written 406,022,512 lines of code'), the Seattle Times adds that 'More African American and Hispanic kids learned about the subject in two days than in the entire history of computer science,' and reports that the cities of Chicago and New York have engaged Code.org to offer CS classes in their schools. So, isn't it a tad hyperbolic to get so excited over kids programming with blocks? 'Yes, we can all agree that this week's big Hour of Code initiative is a publicity stunt,' writes the Mercury News' Mike Cassidy, 'but you know what? A publicity stunt is exactly what we need.'"
I'm pretty sure that the last 3 days are contained within the last 100 years.
And here I thought I needed to keep going after 3 years.
Hour of code is not a bad thing, but this didn't create 12M programmers, much less 12M people who know computer science. They averaged 32.4 lines each.
And to think I wasted all those years of college courses to learn CS. Who knew I could have just done it in 3 days!?
Words.. the summary is missing some.
I work on web apps, with DB back ends. I need to be able to set up the DB structure, create the queries, set the indexes, schedule the DB backups, then set up the web server, code the back end to get the data, write a frontend in javascript using knockout and ajax to make it responsive and usable. Since we have a small development team each of the three of us has to be able to do all of these steps. This is in addition to the ERP programming and interfaces I also do for this.
Is it even possible for new people to come along and learn all of this? I am able just because I learned as it came out piece by piece, but I keep wondering if new people will ever be able to do the full range of things. With a larger team you can split it up, but rarely do you get a team were each person is fully competent and unless there is someone who can call BS on any part of it there is potential for problems.
I also wonder if anyone in their right mind would bother learning all of this. When we interview people under 30 they are saying stuff like "I do Apple IOS programming and nothing else". I know there is a lot of ageism anti-old people sentiment expressed here on /., but when you actually need something done and can't hire 10 people to do it you can't hire these younger people.
That's an awful lot of "Hello World"!
Everything and its opposite is true. Get used to it.
Despite how well this when, and how much work went behind it, the effort, the care, and the love from students, shit-all is going to be done about it afterwards.
There is still going to be this massive gap in the education schedule where a very VERY important skill should be.
Programming isn't just slaving away whacking a keyboard (unless you are in a job that is), it teaches a lot of logic skills, it teaches self-analysis, the ability to find mistakes, co-operation, typing skills (just destroyed that ^), ways to do things quicker, increases creativity and generally a love for creating things on your own.
Sure, people likely will grow out of it, but it is about giving people the OTHER skills that is important.
Programming is a very flexible area that requires a lot of various interconnecting skills which are useful in so many other areas.
So teaching all of these skills together is extremely more time-efficient, money-efficient, and is a heck of a lot more fun.
And while some likely will not get it at all and some even straight up hate it, fine, you can't force everyone to like something.
This would only be entry-level stuff anyway, which will be the most important parts since they are the basis for everything else.
Learning a little about programming and computers is not "CS".
A high-level tutorial is just that, and this is just marketing spin on teaching some computer literacy. It's admirable, but it isn't what they're claiming it is.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Maybe a few of the students who actually spent 100 years learning CS would be able to write a correct ActiveX control in C++.
...about this. Just about everyone in the world is dependent on computers at some point, whether or not it's an immediate influence on their life. Having at least some clue of what's happening under the hood is a Good Thing for them, even if they are never a professional dev or IT person. I know far too many people who have the "black box" mentality, and as a result, are much poorer at interacting with computers than they would otherwise be.
12million new "expert programmers" just hit the tubes.
I wouldn't say any of the participants 'know' Computer Science. All this will result in is the industry being flooded with unqualified, narcissistic, self proclaimed genius types.
They had computer 100 years ago ?
PC Gaming enthousiast that gives comments, opinions and reviews on Games. I'm just having fun with games while doing let
All the mistakes those guys taught them. I figure it will take at least 10 hours.
'Yes, we can all agree that this week's big Hour of Code initiative is a publicity stunt,' writes the Mercury News' Mike Cassidy, 'but you know what? A publicity stunt is exactly what we need.'
Need for what? It's just a way to deflect attention from the real agenda of h1bsrus.org. No, even worse, to convince people that there really is a shortage of programmers, and gosh we're trying to get more Americans to learn it (bonus points for your propaganda if they're minorities), but it takes time, and so we really really need to up the H-1B quota (temporarily, of course) by a million or whatever they want (ask for a million - settle for a half).
I can understand Zuck, et al, spouting propaganda to get out of their personally horrid underprivileged conditions, but what annoys me is the media buying into this crap. How about a little counterpoint that the only indications of a programmer shortage are the testimonials of people with a serious vested interest, and not any of those silly objective facts. Forget programming - what they really need to teach in schools is critical thinking.
I went to high school between 1987-91, and somewhere in there (I think it was my softmore year?) there was a computer class. We learned BASIC on computers which had green characters on a black screen (no windows), and if I recall used 8.5" floppies. There were also some TRS-80s there, but I didn't use them there.
Now personally, since my father owned a VAR that sold minis and mains by IBM, I had already had experience with PCs for many years by then. But that was literally over 20 years ago, in a mandatory high school class.
Was that really that unusual? 20 years later has the rest of the US not caught up with where my high school - in a town of 40k (at the time) - was? If so, then I have a new appreciation for the place...
More Students Learn CS In 3 Days Than Past 100 Years
Translation: The summary poster is a complete idiot who doesn't know the meaning of the terns "computer science", "learn", etc. The only way the numbers make sense is if this 3 day course equals a 4 year degree. Otherwise, I've taught "CS" to dozens of people and I'm sure the numbe of people who have "learned CS" are in the billions.
I read a book on anthropology once, I guess now I'm in the same circles as Jane Goodall.
It's sad that slashdot has fallen enough to post such utter stupidity.
Does this even need to be said?
Computers have not been ubiquitous enough to warrant any kind of mainstream interest since about the past 20 years. Besides that, Gates and Zuckerberg (et al) have been pimping "hour of code" like a 2bit whore for the past few weeks. Dunno what their agenda is but I don't really trust either of them all that much.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Math the media like to show that really doesn't mean much.
1. Well not too many people were studying computer science back in 1913.
2. Computer Science didn't really become a popular major until the 1980's
3. General Population growth and increase in literacy world wide.
4. Growth to IT Demand in large countries India and China.
So yes, while the number is right, it isn't really that useful.
I much rather see the breakdown of demographics of those three days and track their professional changes over a period of time.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Hello there CS grad! Yes, we will hire you but you will work for pennies now.
I got all the way to college without any interest in CS (1980-ish). My older sister insisted "you need to take a programming class" so I added it to my schedule. 30+ years later I'm still programming.
Sometimes the most important thing making someone realize "I can DO that?" I like the idea that kids from "educational averse" cultures are being exposed to CS.
First, of course it's possible for a newcomer to learn "all this". You took years to learn it piecemeal, but they'll learn it all in a week or a semester. Within a year or two, they'll be taking your job as you slip into irrelevance.
But, the new kids on the block won't learn all this because they don't have to. The cloud movement is integrating and automating the manual setup and backup labor that you are referring to. The newcomers simply check the boxes for the services they want and click go. Their coding, if they code, is being done with very high level languages and huge frameworks that makes your PHP work look like assembly language.
Check your six, you're under siege.
If they are programming iOS stand alone apps, why would they need to do anything else?
Because *poof* the next big thing came along. Sometimes you can earn more money by developing both an iOS version of an application and an Android version of an application. On the other hand, if every company you plan to work for is big enough to have a separate Android specialist, there's less of a urgent need to broaden your skill set.
But people need the high-level tutorial in order to get over the notion that apps are "something someone else makes in some mysterious way". Perhaps if more people had gone through such a tutorial, they might not flock to locked-down Apple/Microsoft devices as easily.
learning _about_ CS, maybe, but certainly not learning CS. I'm sure more people learn abount chemistry from Breaking Bad than from your local University's graduate school.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I remember covering BASIC in multiple subjects, during multiple years, in elementary school...and that was a pretty common occurrence. If the "hour of code" counts...I'm not sure how it you be anything more than 1.5-2x larger than US education's sustained BASIC pitch in the 1980s.
I wish they'd teach most people Software Engineering techniques instead. Basically I mean write code that is maintainable. IE actually write functions, use templates/generics, don't use magic numbers, don't have pieces of code for object A in object B, ETC.
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
Forget programming - what they really need to teach in schools is critical thinking.
Programming is one way of building the logic skills that one needs in order to learn critical thinking.
Just what we need. More people putting out more crappy code. As if a large segment of programmers aren't already overpaid for the spaghetti they produce.
We don't need MORE programmers, we need BETTER programmers. There are enough programmers in existence (contrary to what those in the industry will claim) yet the abysmal state of software shows how poorly these people perform.
I would have no problem with a company paying a programmer $250K IF that programmer could produce good code on a daily basis. Instead, we have hordes of overpriced, egotistical, self-important hacks who believe they're worth more than they're paid and the shit we are forced to put up with every day proves it.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Apart from the fact that this whole thing is a horseshit, cynical gimmick designed to drum up public support for big IT corporations - especially in light of all the recent privacy and NSA scandals - under the guise of teaching inner-city yoots (because, gosh darnit, they CARE ) , there is also the entirely unforeseen side benefit of potentially creating a massive influx of new coders into the job market who will serve to fill the ranks of existing code monkeys who provide the sort of cheap and easily fireable labor that American corporations seems to crave so much..
I showed this to 4 kids, 2 girls and 2 boys aged 6 to 12. They all had a great time with it and one girl is already doing the extended lessons drawing geometrical figures.
Maybe none of them will become programmers but they all got that exposure and have the seed planted that they COULD if they worked at it. More importantly, they were motivated to learn something on their own.
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
I'm not trying to start an argument, but computer science deals with the theory of computing in our society whereas information systems and technology deal with the actual use and implementation of computing? These abstract concepts are hard to grasp for me.
Computer science is the scientific and practical approach to computation and its applications. It is the systematic study of the feasibility, structure, expression, and mechanization of the methodical processes (or algorithms) that underlie the acquisition, representation, processing, storage, communication of, and access to information, whether such information is encoded in bits and bytes in a computer memory or transcribed engines and protein structures in a human cell. A computer scientist specializes in the theory of computation and the design of computational systems.
Information system is the study of complementary networks of hardware and software that people and organizations use to collect, filter, process, create, and distribute data.
Information technology is the application of computers and telecommunications equipment to store, retrieve, transmit and manipulate data, often in the context of a business or other enterprise.
they sound the same to me.
1) If CS is so easy to learn, then why are software projects so hard? Like the crapwre that comes out of FB and healthware.gov?
2) If CS so easy easy to learn and so lucrative, why is there a so-called shorter of software engineers?
Coding is only about implementing your logical thinking using a formal language that manages and manipulates resources in a virtual environment.
You can always have coders, but coders come with poor logical thinking.
Hmmm...the #1 city in the world on the leader board is Pompano Beach (FL), and Everett (WA?) is beating NYC, according to the Leaderboard.
Now give them all work at Microsoft as programmers!
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
My company has an internal proprietary app that has an iOS front end and a MS stack for the back end.
I have to keep up with all that and I don't have the time to learn Android.
My company is iOS/MS only and there's no plans whatsoever to change.
So, I should make time and start learning every possible skill that an employer could ever possibly want? And master them? And how do I get on the job experience programming Android in an iOS/MS shop? Like I said, they have absolutely NO desire to use Android.
Because comments such as 'More white kids did x!' would quickly be labeled as racist. Minority double standard, still alive and thriving...
My company has an internal proprietary app that has an iOS front end
Touché. If you're only working on internal applications on the developer enterprise program, that's another factor reducing the urgent need to broaden your skill set, I'll grant.
And how do I get on the job experience programming Android in an iOS/MS shop?
That depends on whether your company also wants to produce an external application. I understand you're already set up to publish an iOS application, but your company probably doesn't want to turn away revenue from potential customers just because their phone isn't Apple.
What a joke! What fool buys into this childish propaganda? Geez. Next you'll give us the "people have evolved in 2,000 years" laugh.
We want the kids to realize that everything complicated is just a collection of simpler parts (until you get small enough), and those simpler parts are generally designed by humans, so there's no good reason why they can't be the ones designing in the future.
Other than they happen to live several states away from the established companies that do such designing. If you want to act in a Broadway play, you have to move to New York. If you want to act in a Hollywood film, you have to move to Los Angeles. I can think of a few Slashdot users who would claim that people who have no way to move to where a trade is practiced shouldn't even bother learning the trade.
Wow, so you hold a seminar to show people what it's like. You give them a few tools, show them a couple of things and that immediately makes them Senior Software Engineers ready to tackle any business problem? No, it's more propaganda from two chodes who want to cheapen the profession. Software Development and Engineering takes years of practice to get right, sure you can teach mechanics in a few months and some would argue you can learn language X in 30 days but it's the application and knowing to use what tool at what time. Here's what's missing in this, did Gates and Fuckerberg hire any of these whiz kids after the class? Not one huh? Well Billy Bob and Fuckerberg put your money where your mouth is! If you think you can teach somebody in a few hours to be a developer, hire them give them a salary, benefits and a cube and give them a chance to prove themselves.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
Same thing with all those MOOCs. Just because you watched some YouTube video does not mean you’re actually proficient in something.
More is not better, when every new comp sci kid comes out thinking that Java is the best thing ever, 64GB of RAM is a minimum, and worrying about scalability is for nerds. Programming != Computer Science.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
I can report that my wife's 7th and 8th grade science classes LOVED the day of code program. Many started out thinking it was impossible to do any coding.. and ended up making some great discoveries. All the kids wanted to stay in the class and "code" rather than go out an play and eat lunch. At least for my wife's school, it was a huge success and hopefully some of the kids will be drawn into a profession they love...
That's bad news for you programmer guys. I often read on this site of the poor working conditions of many coders. This will only make it worse; flooding the labor market full of programmers isn't going to make their lives or jobs any easier, it'll make it worse.
Boss: What is the spec on the site?
Code Monkey: 7 million users, spending about 6000$ each of their own money or governments subsidy. About 42 billion dollars in transactions. That is not counting people directed to other programs. About 70 million window shoppers.
Boss: Hide the window shopping. Don't want them to get sticker shock. No one should see the price without subsidy.
Code Monkey: We are just six weeks from going live. Simply no time to test... The load estimate itself...
Boss: I have taught myself coding in just one hour. Turn in the admin password, and security will let you in this weeked for you to collect your personal effects from your office.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Did we have computers 100 years ago? Perhaps a better headline would have been more students learn cs in 3 days than past 1000 years OR more students learn cs in 3 days than since the dawn of mankind.
Some points to be made:
1. Zuckerburg and Gates only "back" this code.org, they didn't write the hyperbole in the story copy.
2. This was a publicity stunt for sure, but it was targeted for young school aged kids to get exposure to how a computer really works. I wish my kids had it at their school but apparently they did not. 99% will forget it in a week, but it may spark some deeper interests later in life. This is always a good thing
3. The slashdot summary is not "Pollyanna" on the topic; just reporting that it happened. So no, Slashdot is not on the slippery slope to foolishness hell.
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
People who think you can learn CS in a few days should be punished by giving the same kids two days of music, and then having their playback devices loaded with nothing but the resulting tunes.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
We, the employed (or employment-seeking) coders of the world do not want more coders. It's one of the last jobs you can actually sort of get paid a living wage for. The last thing we need is competition.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
Maybe someday people in Silicon Valley will look at Google maps and realize that there are parts of the country outside the Bay Area.
I know, like Austin, Boston, or Seattle. The point of that discussion was that if someone wants to program video games, he needs to move somewhere like Austin, Boston, or Seattle, and get a job there. If he can't, he should get into a trade other than game programming. It's not greater San Francisco vs. rest of world; it's just hotbeds of industry vs. coldbeds.
I'm sitting here all warm and comfy in my home-bubble really excited about the burgeoning renaissance of intellectual prowess exhibited by today's youth as they prepare themselves to march boldly into the information age to create virtual solutions and clever apps to solve every day problems.
But I also just spent the last week fixing main breaks. It could be a small seep or a raging river, but you have to locate the main, drill holes along it and poke down to discover where the most water is escaping, then jackhammer the street and dig down beside it, careful to avoid other utilities. Once the leak is exposed you must decide whether the pump will keep up and you can clamp it under pressure or shut it down. Either way there are pitfalls -- shutting it changes pressure and direction of flow in the system, releasing internal crust buildup in pipes and making water 'dirty', and the valves might not have been operated in years and may be in the same shape as the pipes. Leaving pressure up it is possible that the pipe will blow out in front of you as you clean off the outer crust to clamp it, filling up the hole quickly. Yesterday there were two split-rounds too close to the bells where iron pipes joined, requiring a double notch to be scored at the bottom so the bottom of the pipe is broken out with a sledgehammer (releasing more water into the hole) to allow the bell section to be cut out, measured and a short pipe stub to be inserted, all held snug with a 30-inch steel and rubber clamp. Eventually as the clamp is tightened the torrent becomes a spray, then a trickle, then it stops. The pumps gain and the cold water (up to your waist) subsides and you can climb up and out to say hello to the wind chill factor. People need to do things like this in order to keep the water flowing from the tap.
Most of North America's drinkable water is delivered through pressure systems with iron pipes such as these. There is a move to plastic pipe (which is more chemically stable but has its own issues with taps and joints)...
I am not trying to be incorrigible here, I would just like to remind everyone that there was a time less then 100 years ago when the building of water and sewer and electrical infrastructure was the exciting topic of the day. As often discussed by every day people as data communication is today. The pipes and wires that deliver our infrastructure are aging, and often the tools and techniques available to repair them are little changed from when they were first built out into the wilderness.
To the young coders of tomorrow I would suggest this: while you honing your analytical skills in the information age, take a walk through your city or town and try to see it as it was 50, 100 years ago. This is only yesterday in human terms. There are amazing feats of engineering surrounding you that have been achieved by those who have come before, and in some critical areas innovation has slowed or stopped.
If only one or two in ten of you should choose a path that leads into some practical engineering field, bringing new thinking (and a good measure of resolve) it might stem the signs of decay that are only now becoming evident. Look for them and you will find these signs. They are merely problems, help us to solve them.
In order to do this you will have to develop prowess with electrics and electronics and fluids and chemicals and tools, materials science. You will need to find a way to bring industrial manufacture back to our shores, because (for what ever reason) it has mostly left, and that is not a good thing. You will have to devote a considerable amount of effort to develop energy sources that will work for everyone, not just the few who can afford to buy some this-or-that thing.
In short, if Modern Civilization follows you home and you decide to keep it... make sure you have the necessary skill and motivation to keep it alive and healthy. Or some day in the not-too-distant future the lights (and Internet) might go out, and we might spill out of
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
Than in the century before it.
Just ask the PR spin doctors who can't code their way out of a bread basket.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Cheers!
Retards
... is like calling yourself a rocket scientist after building an Estes model.
Good exposure and all that, but there are a few important differences.
Could inprove the qality of Facebook! ;-)
Hell they should just say in our entire history, I mean you do not have to go that far back to where everything we have today would be considered evil devil black magic.
Satan machines spewing fire and loud bangs - Vehicle
Blinding flashes of light from soul stealing demons - Cam
Chameleon color changing people - Michael Jackson
Shrunken midget traps - TV
Panzy ass music that sounds like a kid with an ultra high voice - Nightcore
Voodoo Plumber control boxes - Nintendo
Yellow head hunting ghost - Pac-Man
Deranged cannibals - Bath salt junkies
Bacon - Bacon
Satanic syrup - Pepsi 3
8008 - Out of wedlock
H.e double - yeah fuck that shit
Holy Fucking Christ - will you Alpha-Geeks get your motherfucking heads out of Mr. Spock's green-tinted colon for a moment and realize that all this bullshit you're spraying about 'real coding' and 'back in my day we had/didn't have XYZ' makes you sound like motherfucking camel-humping, bible-thumping midwestern code Jihadis straight out of a Norman Rockwell acid trip?
You, and you, and yes -you- with the spittle hanging out of the corner of your mouth: Don't you know that you are tradesmen that are hired to use tools in order to either make shit or fix shit? You, o golden nerd, o embodiment of the hardest of the hard core, are essentially 'Bob the Builder'. You are skilled labor. You use the grey shit between your ears to think about a problem, and the most efficient tool that your are either familiar with or is available in order to implement the solution. Tools change over time. Your granddad may have used a hand planer. His may have used a fucking axe, and that poor fucker living in a cave all the way at the beginning of your line or gnawed on the fucking tree trunk with their god damn teeth until he made what he needed. But they all had to formulate a solution to the problem first. They had to *think* first. Then, and only then, could the skills they had be coupled with the tools at hand in order to implement a solution.
The language you use to solve a problem, the fact that you are not typing ascii characters into a text editor and compiling using gcc, the fucking holy war between ending lines with a semicolon or with a CRLF, the intellectual genocides that occur between rival framework camps, are secondary to your solution to the problem. Not your language-specific solution, but your abstracted solution that can be run on anything from a piece of paper with a pencil to the operating system of your choice.
Do you still hand compile code into assembly? No, I didn't think so. And for that one cat in the back that still does, I'm sure you can justify the time expenditure and increased bug risk. Compilers usually do a better job. Eventually, and here's where it gets fun, formal programming languages will go the way of the fucking do-do. The systems will be smart enough to understand human-language commands and act on them, requesting clarification when needed. That's the ultimate goal, isn't it? To have general purpose mechanical servants that perform mindless labor without us having to worry about how the hell they work? Sure, someone will have to write the first few generations of them, but eventually the ecosystem of these things will become self sustaining.
If we make it to the 23rd century, and someone is still typing in code, were fucked.
Ciao, bambino!
There is a big different between participating in something and actually learning something.
It reminds me of schools handing out certificates of participation in athletics days. Congratulations, you know how to walk! Literally everybody else who tried was better than you but congrats anyway!
I too tried the course out a week or so ago.
If you're ten years old and have never been aware of how you can build a set of instructions to get a computer to do what you want it to, I would imagine that this would be pretty inspiring.
And possibly the start of a lifelong passion and career.
So stop acting like spoilt know-it-alls because you've misunderstood the purpose of it and have some other personal axe to grind, I would bet that this will be cited in years to come by some brilliant innovative technologists as the moment they were inspired to get started.
The Gates and Zuckerberg video clips that play between exercises are really really excruciating though.
A computer does what the user says, not what the user means, and I'll grant that there's often a fairly substantial gap between the two. PEBKAC, in essence, means the user isn't saying what he means. It's the job of user experience designers to make it easier for the user to say what he means.
I remember taking CS a hundred years ago.
I agree.
The computer makes no distinction as to whether its user is instructing it by means of a graphical interface, a textual interface, or by whistling or doing a jig. The CPU even scruples to discriminate whether its user considers any part of its execution to be "computer science" or not. It executes its instructions quite without regard for their origin.
What we have here, is a bunch of elitists thinking that text programming is somehow inherently better than other forms of input, when it is simply different.
Yeah and I walked up hill to school, both ways!
That's still a case of the user not knowing what he means. When the user loads a program that contains bugs onto a machine, the user is in effect saying to execute the bugs. Part of the goal of the free software movement is making it possible for the user to know what he means, as binary-only software suffers from indeterminacy.
100 years ago computer science did not exist. The first computer that accepted code was made 70 years ago (ENiAC). The Alan Turing's basic concept for Computer Science was not published until 1936 - 77 years ago. The number of lines of code is not a true value of a computer coder. And 400,000 million lines of the same printf("hello world") really isn't any more different from a chimpanzee typing "S" a million times on a type writer. Code development is hierarchal activity-venture(not parallel) and usable code is limited how many programmers can be coordinated to work together to solve a problem Anything else is just the Infinite Monkey Theorem - where one puts millions and millions of chimpanzees in front of a computer desktop and waits (forever) for them to write the next killer app of Apple. Most people that don't code - underestimate the difficulty and emotionally intense of real world computer development. Coding is more like ghost writing or being a language translator because a programmer-analyst is always trying to write what others want to hear or read (regardless of how well his target audience is able to communicate) - in larger projects people butt heads and moving forward can be problematic at times. So not only do you need an intellectual IQ higher than a monkey - you need the emotional IQ of a saint at times..
gosgog:
One thing you can't do is call "Bill" a dumbass! MSN "8" has been a non-success, almost as bad as Millenium. The Code hour will undoubtedly sell a lot more MSN based computers with '8'....MARKETING, I see it in the Philippines where all Gov't systems, school computers are all based on MSN, donated by "Bill", so everywhere you look, internet cafes, homes, kids with tablets, netbooks, laptops & IT supply stores, mostly MSN, some Apple.
I'm a Linux fan myself, but the rest of he family...MSN & UGH!!FACEBOOK!