[Edu-sig] Teaching Python instead of Java?

[Alan Gauld]

>Ah yes Symbolics... It is best to speak politely of the dead 
:-)
There are still afew around!

> say: both of these machines implemented a complex 
> abstraction in microcode.

True but the microcode is part of the CPU hardware, 
you can't change it in any way.(OK pedantically a 
few experimental chips allow changes to microcode)


> The underlying machines that interpreted the microcode 
> were procedural

I disagree. Microcode operates at a level below procedures, 
it literally just moves data from A to B. The hardware synchronised by the clock
operates on one set of bytes 
at a time, it has no concept of a procedure.

If you ignore the microcode then the hardware is purely 
a bit twiddling function.

> Microcode is more correctly called firmware 
> but so is PCs BIOS. 

No, there is a huge difference in the nature of microcode 
and BIOS code. As big a difference as between assembler 
and Python! Firmware is by definition replaceable, 
microcode, in general, is not.

> There are/were non procedural computers but these 
> two computers are not in that list.

I'll beg to differ, but I doubt the difference if 
strictly pertinent to this list so I won't argue 
either :-)

Alan G