Dependence on Programming Experts

[Judy Perry]

Scott,

Respectfully ('cuz I did buy your guage thingy, which I love, btw, and
would have bought the audio library thingy too if I hadn't been blindsided
by my financial 'bookings in Monterey-Mexico' problem):

Did you read the rest of my post?

(1)  Multiple ways of doing things confuse newcomers.  If you've ever
learned a second (or third or...) language, you may see my point.  Heck, I
even see this in trying to teach a brief fly-by in UI design with my CS
students.  They end up liking the 3 quick rules by Mullet & Sano... NOT
because they like reading the artsy-whatever stuff referenced, but because
they present three simple, reasonably comprehensible, RULES that don't
involve thinking about, well, artsy things.  Rules-based.  Fewer than a
half-dozen ways to do things tolerably well.  And that half-dozen pretty
much covers the spectrum of UI design as opposed to three or four or...
different ways of doing ANY ONE THING.

(2)  Especially with respect to the history of Lingo, "multiple" ways of
doing things, when they include more "concise" (read: obtuse) ways of
doing, virtually guarantee that pretty much every single reference on the
subject will reference FIRST the obtuse way (if not ONLY the obtuse way).
Pick up just about any book on  Lingo or Director and estimate how many
references are for dot.syntax versus verbose Lingo.  Better still, take a
look at a good half-dozen or so to see where these "options" lead, and,
worse, the ignominous end of the "standard" they are optioning.

It's not that I am a completely retarded idiot and cannot understand x =
5, but I have read the multiple writings on the wall with respect to
"options" that ultimately aren't and overtake the "standard"/verbose ways
of doing things.

If I wanted to learn C, I just would.  But I don't.

Judy

On Thu, 13 Jul 2006, Scott Rossi wrote:

> Recently, Judy Perry wrote:
>
> > Because it makes it harder to learn.  Like English.  I don't know what
> > that has to do with 'the establishment,' but it just makes things harder
> > to learn.
>
> I respectfully disagree.  As Richard G has repeated several times already,
> using an alternate assignment is an *option*, just like using abbreviated
> object names (btn, cd, grp).  As an option, it doesn't preclude using the
> current syntax.  Search the list archives and you will repeatedly find the
> phrase "there are multiple ways of accomplishing what you want..."  Perhaps
> you find this confusing but I find this to be one of Rev's strengths.
>
> You can script 'put 5 into x' and be done with it or you can do the
> shorthand version and script 'x = 5'.
>
> For me, this seems pretty reasonable and desirable.
>