How Are Students Learning Programming ?

A recent ComputerWorld article "How are students learning programming in a post-Basic world ?" (It should be BASIC, not Basic) reminds me of the time I first learnt programming.

Yes, with BASIC. When there were very few PCs in Ahmedabad.

I learnt programming with BASIC. The credit goes to my elder brother, Santosh, who convinced me (against my self-doubts) that I could learn computer programming. And once I started, it was SO EASY (I topped the class).

Thank you , Santosh.

Here's a YABASIC program I wrote in 2007 to help my son solve a puzzle (and I don't remember the details of the puzzle) :

print "The problem of 3 daughters"
print  "Find 3 numbers whose product equals the desired number"
input "What is the product of the 3 integers ?"  productof3
DIM AM(productof3,4)
RN=1
FOR I =1 to productof3
IF INT(productof3/I) =  (productof3/I) THEN
FOR J =1 to productof3
IF INT(productof3/J) =  (productof3/J) THEN
For K = 1 to productof3
 IF INT(productof3/K) =  (productof3/K) THEN
#       print "Testing ", I , J , K
        DOESEXIST=0
      IF (I * J * K) = productof3 THEN
#           print "Possible Answer : ", I , J, K, " :  With the Sum as : ", S\
        FOR ARRCHK =1 to RN
            S = I + J + K
            IF ( (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=I AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=J AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=K) OR (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=I AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=K AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=J) OR (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=J AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=I AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=K) OR (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=J AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=K AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=I) OR (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=K AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=I AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=J) OR (AM(ARRCHK,1)=S AND AM(ARRCHK,2)=K AND AM(ARRCHK,3)=J AND AM(ARRCHK,4)=I)  )  THEN
#                   print "..............   Numbers ", I, J, K, "  have already been checked"
               DOESEXIST=1
               BREAK
              ENDIF
        NEXT ARRCHK
                IF DOESEXIST=0 THEN
                  AM(RN,1)=S
                  AM(RN,2)=I
                  AM(RN,3)=J
                  AM(RN,4)=K
                  print "Possible Answer : " , AM(RN,2), AM(RN,3), AM(RN,4) , " : With the sum : ", AM(RN,1)
                ENDIF
         RN = RN +1
     ENDIF
  ENDIF
NEXT K
ENDIF
NEXT J
ENDIF
NEXT I 

Or an example of a program to test a number for whether it is a Prime (very simplistic, not using any of the algorithms -- like the Sieve of Eratosthenes that I used when I wrote a program in the BASIC class in 1985 -- or was it in 1984) :

print "hello world"
# Testing for Prime Numbers
#assign
presult=0
input "Which number ?"  numtotest
print "You entered :  " , numtotest
for I=2 to numtotest/2
IF (numtotest/I) = int(numtotest/I) THEN
# print "Testing division of ", numtotest, "by ", I , " : Is Not a Prime"
presult=1
BREAK
ELSE
# print "possibly a prime when testing division by  ", I
ENDIF
NEXT I
clear screen
if presult=0 then
print colour("red","blue") numtotest,  "   IS A PRIME NUMBER !"
ELSE
print colour("green") numtotest,  "   is not a prime number !"
ENDIF
input "Enter to exit  " mentr 

I have also studied xBase (dBASEIII+), Pascal, C, C++ and Java (besides SQL and PL/SQL). Guess which language I dislike ? It is a 4 letter word.

UPDATE 01-Jul-11 : Here's an article by Joel Spolsky (albeit dated 29-Dec-05) : The Perils of JavaSchools.

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