tried to help a cis-in-law with coding homework. this. was. a. mistake.
i told her you can change variables after you make them. she didn't believe me. "what's the point of a variable if you can change it after you create it!? shouldn't it mean something?"
i was like, "it's.... variable......."
she ended up going to some random guy for help and he gave her an answer that is not going to pass the homework assignment but... and he told her that variables never change
someone. please.. help me.
@feathers oh my goodness.... bwhahahaha
actually tho, this made me realize that the trend of teaching everyone python is probably not a good idea, since it means that static typing and the difference between instantiation and assignment are Never taught these days
I mean, I'm not making a judgement there, for a lot of people that's perfect. We had a lot of data science people at my last job who used things like R and Python, and they honestly didn't care much about CS theory or "doing it right". They just wanted to get the job done with the least fuss, and that's a great capability to have available to people.
On the other hand, I don't want them writing my operating system or router firmware >_>
@feathers there was this moment when an (ex) friend of mine that knew R and Python said, "lol, i could have written that thing you wrote in half the time, i use so much code over here"
so, i told him to go for it. he uh.... yeah. let's just say that without the basics of CS there's a lot of stuff that gets really difficult
as a side note, i never took any CS courses but i beat my head against it and read lots of stone age programming books, so i understand Things most times
@feathers hahaha, is it conceited? i detect no conceit in your declaration tbh, it's more like you're open to a challenge and confident in your skillset. as for myself, if I had to describe me... id say that im the eccentric mountain hermit coder, so detached from present day and reality that people generally don't even know what to make of me and probably stay away because i smell bad and stare at them
(I know just how ridiculous and conceited that sounds, haha, but see above about not caring...)