"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote in
:

Any good teacher will say it's better to guide you until you find the
answer for yourself; you'll be much more satisfied, and know _why_
it's the answer as well as just what the answer is.


That's true, but takes time. Coders seem to dislike spending time on
anything other than their work, even when willing to help, so will
usually give a terse collection of function details, arguments for them,
etc. (And occasionally, RT(F)M should be taken to mean 'I don't know,
and don't want to admit it or spend time discussing it'). I recently got
the impression that

(-: indeed!


I always deliberately remember that Einstein would give a plain answer in
basic language. The fact that he could, and did, was part of what made him
good at what he did. As far as I know, this didn't mean a terse bit of
formula, the plain answer likely took more time and effort. Or would have
done, from anyone with less understanding.

coders who use C++ may not even know how to open a file in ANSI C.

The API references usually just give the calls in an abstracted manner,
parts to assemble, without working context. The wxWidgets guide goes
further, it

Yes. I remember a DOS C compiler/system - I'm pretty sure it was
Microsoft! - that had examples in its help system; I think it even made
it not particularly difficult to use their example code in whatever you
were coding. (It was a split screen thing, blue text on white IIRR as
lots of things were in those days.) I agree, things that give the
abstract answer without context are irritating: IIRR "The Algol report"
was like that, and I was _going_ to say K&R (all hail) too, but I think
they _did_ give examples. (The canonical "Hello world" for example.)


Sounds good. The wxWidgets ones are still a step removed for anyone
converting to wxLua. This is why the closer it is to actually working, the
better. I suspect the older guides may be better, newer ones often make
assumptions about what people should already know. Which is not the best way
for a teacher or professor to behave... If it were all organised into yearly
advances in a syllabus, sure, but I never say a coding guide like that. I
like code to work fast, to solve a problem, to give a working example before
a pupil gets bored and frustrated and their mind clouds with it.

Imagine Orville and Wilbur Wright's frustrations if someone had told them to
study feathers, and refused to let them see a bird fly!

People now seem to think that asking for this is asking for fish when we
should learn to fish. It's not, it's like asking for a working fishing
rod. Which is reasonable, If we break it, we learn more than if we never
see it

Indeed. (I seem to be using that word a lot today!) Of course, the third
line of "give a man a fish ..." is "show him the internet, and he'll
never bother you again" - though whoever wrote that meant that it will
waste his time for ever, rather than educate him, I think!


Indeed.
I will always remember somethign from a Doctor Who story, where the third
Doctor (Pertwee) goes to Tibet and debates with a lama there, and the lama
says something about how happy a goldfish would be if the bowl were emptied
into the ocean. The codtor says, yes, but how much happier that fish would be
if you could empty the ocean into the bowl. Which is basically what
academia is about. The net isn't a good teacher, it's just a new
manifestation of the world. Sink or swim. Telling a person to go out there
and RTFM is about as useful as telling kids in England that if they want to
eat, they must forage in the hedgerows. As most of the real food is in
private land, or hothouses, that's a stance that is both cruel and foolish.


That's a hell of a motivator, especially when the stuff wasn't mine
because the sooner I fixed it, the less trouble I'd be in.

(-:

The lessons were memorable.

Circum-oral clips?

No, no, just a mighty dread of being found out. I was a very secretive kid,
and hated being caught out failing or breaking something. I got the feeling
that my parents didn't care if I got into something I shouldn't so long as I
got myself out of it without them having to know.