From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 109fba,baaf5f793d03d420 X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 10db24,2243248c6a74be5 X-Google-Attributes: gid10db24,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,6154de2e240de72a X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public From: smosha@most.fw.hac.com (Stephen M O'Shaughnessy) Subject: Re: Should I learn C or Pascal? Date: 1996/07/22 Message-ID: #1/1 X-Deja-AN: 169467828 sender: usenet@most.fw.hac.com x-nntp-posting-host: smosha references: <4sord0$l0k@solaria.cc.gatech.edu> organization: MESC mime-version: 1.0 newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.ada,comp.edu Date: 1996-07-22T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: In article , jtbell@presby.edu says... >I do appreciate the counter-argument that it's asking a lot of students >to master both program design skills and language syntax at the same >time. Therefore I respect the decisions made by schools that use a >"non-marketable" language such as Modula-"n" or Scheme as their first >programming language. I think it is a reasonable strategy to start with >such a language, then switch to a "real" language later, in the context >of a four-year degee program. Of course, students may need to be >persuaded that this is actually worthwhile! > What separates a 'real' language from a (fake?) language? Would not the students still have to learn the syntax of even psudocode? Is a 'non-marketable' language inherent in all programmers? Because I can program in assembler, fortran, Forth, HP Basic, Borland C and Ada but I have never written a single line of Modula-"n" or Scheme. All the psudocode I have ever written was made up of bits and pieces of the afore mentioned languages. i.e I have never used a for loop in normal conversation, written or spoken.