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Subject: 
Re: Embedded language support in LPub
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.cad.dev
Date: 
Tue, 8 Apr 2003 23:23:24 GMT
Viewed: 
689 times
  
In lugnet.cad.dev, Mike Walsh writes:

"Dan Boger" <dan@peeron.com> wrote in message
news:20030408155024.GC15747@peeron.com...

[ ... snipped ... ]


it's true that Tcl is probably easier to read and support, over the
phone.  Perl is more powerful, and therefor harder to understand what a
user is trying to do in his code.

Not just over the phone, live and in person as well.  More powerful does not
always mean something s better.  Perl allows people to do a lot of
processing in a very compact syntax.  That can be a good thing or a bad
thing.  The usage of some of Perl's compact syntax can result in code that
is very hard to understand - sometimes even for the author if they haven't
looked at it in a while.  Of course well commented code usually alleviates
these types of problems but it is hard to depend on users to comment their
code well.


I'm not sure this would be an issue for LPub though.


[ ... snipped ... ]

I am curious as to why this might not be an issue for LPub?  With Kevin's
book on the shelves of bookstores (at least I assume it is), there is likely
to be a community of people who are not LUGNET users nor are they hard core
computer users who will be introduced to LPub and all of the other L-Draw
related tools.

I want to make one thing clear....  The embedded scripting is for the power
users...  As power users develop new ideas I will encorporate them into LPub
in a way that the novice does not require the novice to be an expert.

LPub is powerful, yet easy to use, by design.  It will continue to do so.

Hopefully those 7th grade kids won't have such powerful needs that they have
to go learn their first programming language, just to use LPub.


I would think the last thing Kevin would want is to start receiving lots of
e-mail on how to this and how to do that with LPub.  With a fairly small and
what appears to be a highly computer literate user base, LPub can currently
assume a certain level of savy.  I don't think that will always be the case.
LPub has already made it possible for a lot of people to create very nice
instructions quickly who previously didn't have the patience or possibly the
know how to work through the tedious instruction building process.

I already get a lot of email on "how to do this, and how to do that" (Tim
has been not reading my book so that he is sure his book is his own! LOL!)

I've gotten a lot of great input from Tim and others like him.  The emails
come with the territory.


Imagine a 7th grade class being introduced to ML-CAD and related L-Draw
tools for a LEGO based computer project?  Is that audience better served
with a language like Perl or Tcl?  Is a 7th grade class even a target
audience?

The 7th grade class should not need either.  If they do, it is because their
own abilities drive them there, and those abilities will let them move to
whatever laguages that are chosen.

Kevin


Another $0.02 from me - now I am up to $0.04 as well!  ;-)

Mike


--
Mike Walsh - mike_walsh at mindspring.com
http://www.ncltc.cc - North Carolina LEGO Train Club
http://www.carolinatrainbuilders.com - Carolina Train Builders
http://www.bricklink.com/store.asp?p=mpw - CTB/Brick Depot



Message is in Reply To:
  Re: Embedded language support in LPub
 
"Dan Boger" <dan@peeron.com> wrote in message news:20030408155024....ron.com... [ ... snipped ... ] (...) Not just over the phone, live and in person as well. More powerful does not always mean something s better. Perl allows people to do a lot of (...) (22 years ago, 8-Apr-03, to lugnet.cad.dev)

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