[Edu-sig] A case against GUIs in intro CS

[Kirby Urner]

> > This would seem very austere to newbies, but we'd perpetuate
> > the ethos that GUIs are for gimps -- you don't need those handicaps to
> > play the game.  But it'd be a mock attitude, i.e. we secretly respect 
> > GUIs (the good ones) and write them ourselves.
> 
> Yikes. Any "gimp" who has had to work with a programmer "educated" in this
> sort user-hostile rhetoric knows that it leaves a lot to be desired. I
> can't understand why anyone would want to actively promote it, except as a
> joke about the foolishness of some programmers. A wiser approach is to
> encourage students to use the best tool for the job.
> 
> Toby

The use of 'gimp' was a play on Gimp, the source of GTK, a premier X-Windows
library.

It's not supposed to come across as hostile, but simply as reassurance to a
resolute core group, that command-line savvy is not in vain.  We're
contenders.  We matter.  That sort of thing.  Cheer leading.  And then
there's an edge to it, because you don't want to envy the competition so
much that your concentration fails.  So we bad-mouth the GUI people a
little, but only to keep our spirits up, as we're secretly in love with
GNOME, KDE, and the rest of them.  In fact, we're all on the same team.  I
code GUIs, and I like command-line straightforwardness.  I'm representative
of a huge group of coders.

Kirby