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Hour of Code Kicks Off In Chile With Dog Poop-Themed CS Tutorial

Posted by timothy on from the localization-is-important dept.

theodp writes: In an interesting contrast to the Disney princess-themed Hour of Code tutorial that 'taught President Obama to code' last December, Chile is kicking off its 2015 Hora del Codigo this week with a top-featured Blockly tutorial that teaches computer science by having kids drag-and-drop blocks of code to pick up dog poop. "Collect all the shit you have left your dog," reads the Google translated instructions for the final coding exercise. In its new video for the Hour of Code 2015 campaign, tech billionaire-backed Code.org notes that it's striving to reach 200 million schoolchildren worldwide by this December. Presumably towards that end, Code.org warns that it will penalize Computer Science tutorials that "work only in English."

17 of 49 comments (clear)

  1. Down under by pushing-robot · · Score: 2

    "Collect all the shit you have left your dog"

    The southern hemisphere never ceases to amaze me.

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    1. Re:Down under by phantomfive · · Score: 2

      But "que han dejado tus perros" means "that have left your dogs" with a stylish order change (the real meaning is "that your dogs have left").......but as a matter of fact even people might fail at understanding that.

      If you wanted to clarify that the dogs were left (not the caca), then you can add 'a' to indicate the object, as in "...que han dejado a tus perros."

      (not sure about "caca", though).

      Caca is correctly translated as 'shit' (though swear words vary depending on the country. We do this in English too: bloody and shag are not swear words in America, but are in England).

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    2. Re: Down under by KGIII · · Score: 1

      I would say 'usted tienes' but, then again, mi Espanol es muy mierda.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  2. Using Ubuntu? by tomhath · · Score: 2

    Ubuntu's desktop color scheme looks like poop to me.

  3. English+spanish in the code. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I wrote code in spanglish (a combination of words in english and spanish) and this is not a problem.
    The compiler accepted this language spanglish, so that it is not wrong in its parser, except invented an english-only-compiler.
    Hispanic people is big for writing all code in english only, almost them do not understand english.

  4. Is this from the same people... by Rei · · Score: 1

    ... who brought us the available-in-30-languages childrens' book "The Little Mole Who Wanted to Know Who Pooped on His Head"?

    --
    The human body can be drained of blood in 8.6 seconds given adequate vacuuming systems.
    1. Re:Is this from the same people... by vikingpower · · Score: 1

      Nope. Those were Germans. Who else would have?

      --
      Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
  5. Every human language leaves out information by tepples · · Score: 1

    when the source language admits to intentionally leaving out information

    Every human language leaves out information. Different languages just leave out different amounts in different ways in different circumstances. This is why instead of relying on Google Translate, the author of an Hour of Code activity this year is going to have to hire a professional translator who can ask the author for the information that one language left out for use in a translation to another language.

  6. On the other hand... by CODiNE · · Score: 3, Informative

    This is a pretty accurate description of how management views coders. Who's behind code.org again? Oh right... Better get the kids used to the idea of digital poop scooping so they can expect appropriate pay when they grow up.

    --
    Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
    1. Re:On the other hand... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The kid can expect all he wants. The reality is that by the time he finishes his "education", there will be so many fungible shitty "coders" like him, that he must accept permanent minimum wages (and force the same thing on all properly educated college graduates), or get the fuck out of the way.

      Or he could flip burgers at McDonalds' and feed the next generation of slaves.

    2. Re:On the other hand... by danomac · · Score: 1

      Yep, it's preparing the kids for a crap-tacular job dealing with crap-tastic management!

  7. If they want more girls to go into programming... by Nutria · · Score: 2

    I don't think that shit-gathering contests are the way to stir up that interest.

    --
    "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
  8. Really? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    "Code.org warns that it will penalize Computer Science tutorials that 'work only in English.'"

    Seriously, f*** you, code.org.

    1. Re:Really? by 0100010001010011 · · Score: 1

      Because coding isn't a job. It's a skill. You sound like the last of the keyboardists throwing up their hands going "But everyone will know how to type. Our jobs are doooooooomed.".

      What was once hard is now easy and is now curriculum for kids. Just like Algebra and Calculus before it.

  9. Re:work only in english? by theodp · · Score: 1

    Go To Hell Statement Considered Harmful: "In our definition of an algorithm we have stressed that the primitive actions should be executable, that they should be done. "Go to the other side of the square." is perfectly acceptable, "Go to hell.", however, is not an algorithm but a curse, because it cannot be done."
    --Edsger W. Dijkstra, 11 May 1930 - 6 August 2002

  10. Re:work only in english? by ATMAvatar · · Score: 1

    English is _the_ human language of coding. Get over the fact.

    The phrase you are looking for is lingua franca (which amusingly is not itself English).

    --
    "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
  11. No. Learn English. by russotto · · Score: 1

    If you're eventually going to be working with me (that is, if I'm going to be "knowledge transferring" to your next-to-worthless ass so I can get one last bonus before they lay me off), learn English. Because I'm not going to be learning anything else.