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Top-level
 @mhoye A whole lot of that is just C being an awful language. Which okay might be related to the unix brainworms, but it's a bit chicken and egg at that point. Also the last error message literally tells you what to do right with a short example too. Which I think might be related to relatively recent improvements in GCC's messages (there's ongoing work there). 4 comments
@flyingsaceur @mhoye I didn't have much issues with such courses, but then I was already *working* in C by the time I had it so I unfortunately wouldn't quite know. I'm not sure which book I used to learn it, but definitely I wouldn't say that C is the kind of language you have a fun time learning exploratively. It's no Racket (which incidentally also has pretty great docs and error messages thanks to all the dynamic checks and contract stuff).  @lispi314 @mhoye Yup - the UNIX way is to build up calluses and muscle memory. You probably saw that failing example and remember the figurative nun rapping your knuckles for mixing them up and never forgot. Pain, some will say, is the best teacher. On the other extreme, I’ve worked with Python stuff where I had to read the source to find things they never bothered to document. I’m still not sure how I feel about that @flyingsaceur @mhoye I'm not very fond of languages and systems that are not self-documenting at this point (which basically removes all non-dynamic languages). #Scheme implementations tend to not do this as well as #Lisp implementations in my experience, and rely more on external tooling to handle it. #Racket again does it somewhat better than other Schemes, but yeah. Unfortunately, I also recognize the need in some places for static languages, so I insist on duly standardized ones. |
Gregory's Server
@lispi314 @mhoye the third leg on that stool is K&R, or short of that an undergrad course with C. There is a barrier of entry where you have to know what you are doing to know what you are doing. You have to get whacked by the paddle before they teach you the secret handshake. And like other kinds of hazing, or weeder courses, making people want to quit is the point