September 24, 2009 at 6:54 am
A bit OT but this bears on the subject
http://www.salon.com/books/int/2009/09/19/better_pencil/index.html
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-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers --
September 24, 2009 at 7:50 am
I'm one of those that does think everyone should learn a low level language. I'm not sure I'd say assembler, but I think everyone should still have to spend some time in C/Pascal. It builds fundamentals and understanding of how the computer processes things. You miss that if you start with a high level language.
We still teach kids to add two numbers and sound out words. We have calculators, and they are used to bring them along faster now. You can learn calculus in 10th or 11th grade now. When I was a kid it took you until 12th minimum. A generation before me you might not get it until college, maybe even 2nd year.
There is more to learn, and many people can progress quicker, but we ought to still get them through some fundamentals.
That, IMHO, applies in DBA work as well. If you have to administer a SQL Server, then it pays to learn things. You ought to improve your knowledge every day.
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September 24, 2009 at 10:53 am
Steve Jones - Editor (9/24/2009)
I'm one of those that does think everyone should learn a low level language. I'm not sure I'd say assembler, but I think everyone should still have to spend some time in C/Pascal. It builds fundamentals and understanding of how the computer processes things. You miss that if you start with a high level language.....
Absolutely. If you only know high level languages, you don't really have an understanding about what is actually going on, you only see merely the abstraction created by the high level layer.
I had one class years ago in networking, and the instructor seemed to know the subject in the sense of 'when this happens you need to do that'. But it became painful when the subject happened to mention stack overflow. He clearly had NO CLUE as to what a stack overflow actually was (or how a stack worked, for that matter).
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-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers --
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