do...until wisdom needed...

[Ben Wolfson]

In article <9d92fo01thk at news2.newsguy.com>, "Alex Martelli"
<aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:

> IS it widespread?  Is the _typical_ CS student, who was taught a CS
> course in Scheme at some institution of higher learning, of the "don't
> like to have their mind bent" persuasion, to the point of feeling
> "resentful of Scheme"?!?  Seems a doubtful hypothesis to me -- do others
> who know typical US CS graduates first-hand have a more informed
> opinion?

At the University of Chicago, the first-year programming sequence uses
Scheme, C++, and C++ (three quarters).  I liked the first quarter far
more than the second, and I suspect that were I taking the third I would
have liked it more than that,too.  I'm not incredibly moved to use
Scheme, though, because we didn't really learn how to use the
language--nothing about how a package/module system might work--I don't
even know if there is one.  Nothing about standard libraries.  Nothing
about user interaction, really, or manipulating files, or a dozen other
things.  SICP doesn't mention them either.  I can't really afford to buy
expensive programming books to learn them, interested though I am.

-- 
Barnabas T. Rumjuggler
"Et tu, Brute?" sedulous.
 -- barry in indy, in apihna