[erlang-questions] Onboarding programmers who are new to Erlang

[Raoul Duke]

also: (do you agree or not, i am curious) teach that one should reach
for OTP first, rather than assuming one will do it at the "low level"
of rolling your own stuff from "base" erlang-w/out-otp.

On Thu, Aug 28, 2014 at 3:35 PM, Robert Raschke <rtrlists@REDACTED> wrote:
> Hi Leonard,
>
> one of the most important lessons to impart, is showing that there exist
> several  really big different ways of tackling programming problems:
> imperative, object oriented (class based, object copying, multi dispatch,
> message passing, ...), functional, declarative, logic, array, concurrent,
> parallel, distributed, ... And that these overlap in a lot of places.
>
> In essence, it is about open minds, the ability to listen to someone else's
> opinion, without rejecting it outright.
>
> At a practical level, for Erlang in particular, this could mean: teach
> single assignment, pattern matching (aka deconstruction), list based
> recursion, list and binary comprehension, process linking, supervision and
> "let it crash". On top of that, encourage the examination of the libraries
> that come as standard with the Erlang release.
>
> Any of the existing Erlang books can help. Also, some people learn better in
> courses, others from books, most need some kind of practice based in
> reality. Made up simple problems are nice for exposition, but lack in
> imparting knowledge that sticks.
>
> Regards,
> Robby
>
> On Aug 28, 2014 5:48 PM, "Leonard Boyce" <leonard.boyce@REDACTED>
> wrote:
>>
>> I'd like to tap the collective wisdom of the group for their
>> experiences in onboarding fresh-out-of-college programmers who are new
>> to Erlang. This is assuming the new programmer has mostly imperative
>> experience (C/C++/Java) and have had a fleeting glimpse of functional
>> through Haskell.
>>
>> I'm of the mindset to have them work through a book or two over the
>> 1st couple of weeks with plenty of rubber ducking and/or pairing on
>> simple exercises.
>>
>> After that maybe have them work on a simple feature or two in some
>> prototypical work we're doing on the side, and of course sending them
>> off to the first available 'bootcamp'/training session available.
>>
>> What have you found is the best way to introduce them to the language
>> and bring them up to a level where they can start standing on their
>> own feet?
>>
>> Are there any specific resources (books/sessions/tutorials etc) you've
>> found useful in the past?
>>
>> Any other recommendations?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Leonard
>> ---
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