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Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2024 08:51:58 +1300
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Subject: Re: Computer Science and sub-projects
To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
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From: Mark Aitchison via Cygwin <cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
Reply-To: Mark Aitchison <M DOT Aitchison AT chch DOT PlaNET DOT org DOT NZ>
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On 19/10/24 07:08, Jim Garrison via Cygwin wrote:
>>
>> I'm gonna go with this is an unfixable problem. The quality of the workers is for the 
>> most part so bad, you can't manager your way to a solution.
>> Unfortunately, modern life requires way more code than the handful of actually good 
>> programmers can hope to address.
>>
>
> Having been a developer since the early 70s I agree, the problem is unfixable without a 
> major breakthrough in understanding what makes a good developer.
>
> I have an analogy.  Coding is like playing the recorder...

Extending the analogy a bit: people need to play a musical instrument for quite a while 
to do it well, and they need honest feedback (after they get to the level of experience 
they can take it).

I think projects/mailing lists like this are pretty close to the essence of what budding 
programmers need... decades ago someone doing Computer Science at university probably was 
taking it because they were the type of person that had already played around with a home 
computer for hours, and knew a bit about what worked and what didn't, and lapped up the 
knowledge a formal course could provide. They might even use spare computer time on the 
"big university computer" to calculate pi for umpteen decimal places for fun.  For quite 
a while now, I am sure, a large number of COSC students are there because somebody told 
them they can earn good money, whether they are genuinely interested or not. And to some 
extent educators cater to this by saying things like "web web design is enough of a skill 
that you should be able to get a Computer Science degree for choosing fonts the way the 
lecturer likes them, so it doesn't matter a graduate cannot write even a Fizz-Buzz* program".

How about projects like cygwin work with universities to provide "junior" versions of 
mailing lists with sub-projects that could be within the range of students, so they get a 
feeling for collaboration, update-histories, style standards, reading others' code, 
feedback from seasoned developers, etc.??

Mark Aitchison,

Christchurch, New Zealand

*Fizz-Buzz (I think I have the name correct): a really simple program that prints "Fizz" 
if a number is divisible by 3 and "Buzz" if divisible by 5, and "Fizz-Buzz" if both, for 
(say) numbers from 1 to 100. A kind of "Bridge of Asses" - if you understand programming 
you should be able to do it.

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