[erlang-questions] Erlang for youngsters

[Miles Fidelman]

Garrett Smith wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 16, 2014 at 9:51 AM, Torben Hoffmann
> <torben.hoffmann@REDACTED> wrote:
>
> -snip-
>
>> I think that a learning resource focused on teaching people the Erlang model from the
>> ground up would be a great improvement. A clear narrative around how do we solve a
>> problem the Erlang way. Teaching the basic constructs is not the problem.
>>
>> My initial target for such a learning resources would be young people in the higher
>> grades of elementary school, say 12-15 years. Why? Because I want to influence them
>> before their minds are totally corrupted by other programming models.
>>
>> I don't think we would have to dumb anything down in particular for this group - we
>> just have to find a cool example and organise the learning around how to become so
>> good that one can solve such a problem.
>> Some sort of game will probably be the best candidate, say, some sort of Transport
>> Tycoon clone?!?!
> I don't have enough experience teaching programming to this age group
> to provide anything more than a hunch. But I suspect that the Erlang
> way, which is hard enough for very seasoned programmers to grok, might
> be a bit ambitious for these young learners.
>
> I'm speaking in particular about the model that emerges when you
> isolate processes. It changes everything: your approach to building
> software (move from state oriented to activity oriented), error
> handling (move from defensive measures to assertive/let-it-crash),
> program structure (from monolith to system), and so on. The benefits
> of this shift are hard to get across, in my experience anyway. I wish
> it wasn't, or I wish I was better at communicating.
>
>

I'm with the folks who suggest that this group has fewer pre-conceptions 
to unlearn.

It strikes me that the actor model is far more natural for certain 
classes of problems - network code, simulation, and gaming come to 
mind.  It's simply conceptually easier to think in terms of LOTS of 
independent processes.

Miles Fidelman


-- 
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In practice, there is.   .... Yogi Berra