D vs Java as a first programming language

[Bill Baxter]

On Mon, Sep 29, 2008 at 9:12 AM, Chris R. Miller
<lordsauronthegreat at gmail.com> wrote:
> Sean Kelly wrote:
>>
>> Nicolas Sicard wrote:
>>>
>>> I am a teacher in a field where my students don't know what a programming
>>> language is! I need a language for a first approach of programming. I would
>>> say that Pascal, or BASIC even if a bit outdated, or even D would fit, but
>>> not Java.
>>>
>>> I can imagine my first lesson with Java:
>>>
>>>    public class HelloWorld {
>>>        public static void main(String[] args) {
>>>            System.out.print("Hello world!");
>>>        }
>>>    }
>>>
>>> I would have to explain what a class is. What a method is. What a public
>>> or private visibility means. What a static method is. What the dots in
>>> "System.out.print" mean... :) Then how to compile it. Why you can't run it
>>> without a virtual machine. A virtual what?
>>
>> The typical approach to this tends to be "just put this stuff in the file
>> and ignore it--I'll explain it later.  I never understood why this is
>> considered a good teaching method :-)
>
> There are so many concepts and mechanics that are at work with even the
> simplest Hello World in wee simple C that it's completely irrational to
> expect a student new to programming to comprehend what's going on.  Just
> think about it...
>
> #include <stdio.h>
>
> int main(){
>    printf("Hello, world!");
>    return 0;
> }
>
> Right there!  More concepts than can even be explained!  You have the
> concept of an include, and how the parser literally strings all the files
> together to create a processed source code, then how the compiler creates a
> new C run time in suspended animation which will then run the function
> main(), and how printf is supplied by the include directive earlier.  We get
> it 'cause we've been trained.  To a lot of kids it's a completely foreign
> thing.  I mean... gee, this computer is hecka dumb 'n stuff if we need to
> tell it where to find out how to talk through the display!  Not to mention
> the distinction of a constant character array, arrays in general, string
> literals, types, casting, return values, etc.  It's a crazy world!
>
> At a certain point you have to pedagogically ask the student to take certain
> things on faith until you can better explain it all.

You forgot the "\n" in your printf, which is another thing to explain
to the poor helpless students.

--bb