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Re: Programming Tools -- How Prevalent Are They? - LONG
Subject:Re: Programming Tools -- How Prevalent Are They? - LONG From:scot <scot -at- HCI -dot- COM -dot- AU> Date:Tue, 4 Jun 1996 16:45:58 +1000
>When authoring reference information, the text book doesn't cover it any
>more gang. The younger gens (like gen X and below... to which I belong by
>the way) don't have the attention span to pour over reams of DBC's (dense
>blocks of crap) to find out how to sub-class a function. And, lets face
>facts. The people pioneering and using the newer techniques (especially
>true OO, not VB or other screen scapers) are from the younger
>"tv-visual-driven" generations. (Bill Gates, Scott McNeely, Marc
>Andressen, the guys at Yahoo are just a few examples.)
This seems far to glib to me. The "pioneers" in this area, for me, don't
include Gates (good businessman, very average programmer), and you left out
people like Ken Thomson who ARE NOT Gen X-ers!
I'm a Gen-Xer (ie 25 - 35 yo) and I can certainly say that the stereotype of
"Gen-X" (its just a marketing term anyway) is no way to classify programming
tool use, let alone anything else (eg I don't watch much TV, I read avidly
and I listen to Radio National (ABC-radio, mostly talk about both the
mundane and the esoteric) a lot) ... & I program in PERL, HTML and soon
enough, JAVA.
>text books all together. Bottom line, the Civics book can't compete with a
>"history of gov't in the US" CD produced by Disney or some other multimedia
>conglomerate, when it comes to effectiveness of communication. The visual
I would dispute that. The disney MM works because of --marketing hype-- not
because it effectively communicates. Take Microsoft's alleged encyclopedia
for instance.
Anyway, the best way to read Shakespeare is still a book! (ie the richness
of communication ...)
Show me a multimedia title that's as rich as that, and I'll concede your
point (and, no, "compleat" Shakespeares on CDROM with biographical detail,
irrelevant pictures and extracts from L. Olivier plays, don't count, they
are difficult to read).
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