Who Programs?
Think back to the fifties, if you will, and the prototypical image of
a programmer is probably as follows: a man; dark suit; crew cut;
briefcase; probably worked for a large corporation like IBM. In
short, a specialist.
Today's programmer is very different. In particular, today's
programmer fits almost no stereotypes. This is because just
about everyone who uses computers in their daily work programs, so
programmers are as diverse as society itself. Consider these examples:
- When a person uses a keyword query on a Web search engine, they
write a small program which is run over the information in the
engine's database. For example, the query
Texas AND
armadillo is a small program, as is Texas NEAR armadillo
AND (NOT Arkansas).
- Spreadsheets take formulas that process either cells or whole
rows and columns or more. These formulas are small programs that tell
the spreadsheet program how to compute the value of certain cells (as
well as perform i/o, and so forth).
- Style-sheets in word processors are also programs. A style-sheet
that does something similar to sections numbering has all the elements
of a program: it must hold the current section number, increment the
section number, deal with sub-sections, and so on.
In short, programs (and programmers) are all around us. Teachers who
want to prepare their students to succeed in this kind of society must
teach them principles, not just the specific details of some
particular language. The most important question is, therefore, which
programming language will best illustrate these principles.
PLT /
scheme@cs.rice.edu
Last modified at 22:30:17 CST on Sunday, February 08, 1998