Re: Functional Paradigm popularity and Maths

[Pixel <address@hidden>]

Shriram Krishnamurthi <sk@cs.brown.edu> writes:

> "KELLEHER,KEVIN (Non-HP-Roseville,ex1)" <kevin_kelleher@non.hp.com> writes:
>
> > Another problem is that many texts that introduce Scheme presume that
> > the reader has some amount of mathematical sophistication.  I mean,
> > one goes quite literally from an example of how to add two numbers
> > to how to represent differential equations.  For some of you, differential
> > equations are as simple as addition;  for me, they are a vague, almost
> > Proustian memory.  Mathematical examples, such as one finds in
> > "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs" (online at
> > http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book.html) ironically
> > do not contribute to the clarity and instructiveness of the text
> > to Joe Programmer.

> SICP is not the only way to approach the Scheme world.  Here's another 
> textbook, just as academic in pedigree and outlook, that has nothing
> to do with differential equations (unless you're the kind of person
> who tries to find them hiding under every rock):
> 
>   http://www.htdp.org/

The audience is still very CS / students.

I think it still doesn't help the learn-by-examples & worse-is-better &
patchwork-coding & all-i-want-is-to-make-it-work people.

If you look at this book and compare it with "classical" python/perl/ruby
"litterature", you'll still find it *very* different. One of the difference is
the bottom-up vs top-down way of presenting things.

- in "Programming Ruby", in the first 20 pages, you've already seen: OO,
arrays, control structures, iterators, regexps, I/O
- in "Programming Python", in the first 65 pages, you have a "Sneak Preview"

Those books show the power of the language, *not* the complexity/tricks. 
Those tricks may bite you later, but *after* trying/getting-accustomed-to the
language.

Even in "Haskell School of Expression" whose goal "Learning Functional
Programming through Multimedia" may interest people, it is still very
didactic, explaining everything. The result is that it takes a lot of pages to
get to some interesting/non-trivial examples.

--
Pixel
programming languages addict      http://merd.net/pixel/language-study/