Path: utzoo!lsuc!maccs!ns From: ns@maccs.McMaster.CA (Nicholas Solntseff) Newsgroups: comp.edu Subject: Re: a point to ponder Message-ID: <1304@maccs.McMaster.CA> Date: 8 Jul 88 20:43:14 GMT References: <82400008@p.cs.uiuc.edu> <2103@boulder.Colorado.EDU> Reply-To: ns@maccs.UUCP (Nicholas Solntseff) Organization: McMaster U., Hamilton, Ont., Can. Lines: 23 >In article <2103@boulder.Colorado.EDU> cdash@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Charles Shub) writes: >>In article <82400008@p.cs.uiuc.edu>, gillies@p.cs.uiuc.edu writes: >>> Think back a mere 15 years -- >>> how was computer science taught at the major schools? People >>> submitted card decks to computer operators and picked up their >>> printouts [ much much ] later. >> >>And because of the turnaround, we wrote programs differently than we do now. >>We would find the errors instead of letting the compiler do it. Is the change >>in how we write and debug code for the better or the worse ? Why ? >>-- Some seventeen years ago, when I was visiting a University in another country I observed students punching several alternative versions of their programs in order to beat a three- or four-hour turnaround with the batch system then in use. There must have been other places where the compiler took the place of human thinking! Plus ca change ...