“For all the C-Programmers out there. If you heard this song you will never try to use programming languages other than C again^^ I don’t know who wrote the lyrics but I like them”
Lyrics Of This SOng…………………
“Write in C”
And as the deadline fast approaches,
and bugs are all that i can see
Someone Somewhere whispers:
“Write in C”
Write in C,Write in C
Write in C, Oh, Write in C,
LOGO’s dead and burried,
Write in C!!
i used to write lot of FORTARN
For Science it worked flawlessely
Try Using it for GRAPHICS
Write in C!!
And if you’ve nearly 30 hours
debugging some Assembely
Soon You will glad to
Write in C!!
Write in C,Write in C
Write in C, Oh, Write in C,
BASIC’s not the Answer,
Write in C!!
Write in C,Write in C
Write in C, Oh, Write in C,
PASCLE won’t quite
Write in C!!
After work, the question got asked. It came up in the context of another discussion about the relevance of Free/Open Source Software. Availability of the source code is probably only relevant to computer programmers. After all, if you aren’t a programmer, what would you do with source code? In which case, a freely copyable binary would be equivalent to freely copyable source code. The ability to do something with the source code (i.e. to create a derivative work), is something only a programmer could do. Strikes me as the definition of a programmer. Yes, I know that benefits might accrue to the non-programmer indirectly, but conceding that there are no direct benefits to most people doesn’t seem like a great debating point.
We know that only 2.4% of the population are employed in “computer and mathematical occupations”. Which would seem to put an upper bound on the number of people to whom Free and Open Source Software would be relevant. And any movement which can only possibly be relevant to such a small fraction of the population is going to have difficulty garnering widespread support, or even interest. Assuming, of course, that we restrict ourselves to professional programmers. There might be amateur programmers.
And so, we come to the real questions: who should be a programmer? Who should be considered a programmer? Is the correct analogy that the skill of programming is like the skill of reading and writing? An esoteric skill for most of the world’s history — practiced only by specialists — professional scribes — until, in the last few hundred years, we came to expect that everybody ought to be a scribe, or at least literate. Even if only a relatively small number of people read or write for a living?
Or, is the correct analogy that being a programmer is more like being a radio technician and learning Morse code? An esoteric skill which remains esoteric.
Is it more like being a driver (chauffeur)? Or a pilot?
Because, I fear that if it is the latter, then the Free and Open Source Software has more in common with the national association for Amateur Radio than the National Institute for Literacy.
This idea of universal computer literacy has deep roots. The work that led to the desktop computing environments we use today was motivated by that vision. Alan Kay talks about it at length here.
