[thelist] Teach Old Programmer New Tricks

[Phil Turmel]

On 01/27/2011 08:30 PM, Hassan Schroeder wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 27, 2011 at 5:20 PM, T. R. Valentine <trvalentine at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> It may surprise some people, but there is still a lot of COBOL code
>> still in use.

As as keep telling my son, who is taking 'C' this semester as part of his engineering program: "If you have one computer language under your belt, the rest is just syntax.  The real action is in data structures and algorithms."  Fred, you could expose your friend to one of the various flavors of OOP, and maybe an M-V-C framework thrown in for kicks.  If he dives in, encourage him.

> It's just not the same without the punch cards, man.

I just missed the punch cards.  But I did have to use printing terminals as a college freshman, as the new-fangled CRTs were reserved for upperclassmen.

> /* speaking as someone whose first job in the computer business
>     was as an IBM CE ("customer engineer") fixing keypunches, and
>     who has also actually done some COBOL programming, though
>     never in anger.  :-)
>  */

Thank you, Hassan, for making me feel young again.

Phil