back to article A Year of Code timeline: History of a HYPEGASM

The government's "Year of Code" scheme, chaired by former Tory advisor Rohan Silva, has generated more comments from you than anything else this week. Here's a bite-sized timeline to put the whole story in context. February 2007: Saul Klein joins London VC firm Index Ventures. In May, he sets up Seedcamp in Europe. It's a …

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  1. Jason Bloomberg Silver badge

    Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but...

    Don't forget the founders of the Raspberry Pi Foundation also identified a need for better computing, programming and coding skills, and that echoes what any number of businesses have been saying for years.

    There is a long history of IT and 'computing' being sold as 'the future' with an acknowledged corresponding need to have people capable of working in that field. That does seem to have turned to doing something about it culminating, in part, in the Year of Code.

    It's okay leaving people to join up the dots, but there seems to be a number of dots being left out.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but...

      There may be "a need for better computing, programming and coding skills", but the likes of Silva, Klein and career politicians have used it to create a gravy train for themselves. I very much doubt that many, if any, competent coders will result from this scheme.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Flame

      Re: Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but...

      Yes, along with education wonder-guru Gove attaching himself to the RasPi and grass-roots calls for better IT education coming from the very 'snobs' that Mr Cellan-Jones thinks makes up the coding world based on his broad survey of a handful of fucking YouTube comments. But then that's all computers are, aren't they Rory? Magic tellies that can replay your flapping face over and over again because no-one will let you have a proper programme.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but...

      really it's just political friends with their noses in the trough under the guise of helping kids to "code"

      She could have taken a "1 day" course in her first few weeks in the job, is this is how serious she takes the desired outcomes? or is it rather just millions for the smart arsehole's who've engineered masses of future public contracts with the promise of a bit of positive PR from the PR government (over those who have the experience to deliver but didn't drift in the right circles)

      That positive PR may cost software engineers already lacking value and respect by trying to reduce software development to a bit of web UI programming at most, and is likely to do nothing to advance software development beyond placing a sticking plaster over the mess of IT the curriculum.

      I can see it now; finance directors around the country wondering why they are paying £30k a year for programmers after helping their 8 year old make a jquery textbox fade in and out, and halving the time allowed to complete the next milestone

    4. Gene Cash Silver badge

      Re: Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but...

      I know people that can code in both Microsoft Word *and* Netscape!

      Most of the people I know "needing coders and STEM skills" want them for US$20K/year.

      It's not a "skill shortage" - it's a "*cheap* skill shortage"

  2. alain williams Silver badge

    Message to Rory Cellan-Jones

    I think that the Year of code is a good idea in principle, but:

    * why only one year ? It is a skill that will be needed by all kids from now on, forever.

    * 'exclusive' ? Eh ? I see the main value of the year of code as giving people a clue as to how computers work; lift them up from the level of icon button pushers. This should make them more effective users since they will have some clue as to the limitations and strengths of computers. I don't expect many of them will want to become programmers. This insight is similar to the reason why history and geography are taught in school - education on matters that are important so that we understand our place in the world.

  3. lee harvey osmond

    Saul Klein?

    I'll admit it, you had me at 'Saul'.

    http://kingjamesprogramming.tumblr.com/post/69208241398/it-seems-to-me-that-the-quotes-like-to-stay-in-one

    "Each processor would proceed sequentially as if it had been better for them not to rise against Saul."

  4. Bob Vistakin
    Facepalm

    "Ows about that then, now then, now then"

    As another BBC employee with as much credibility as the shameless parasites running this fiasco might have said.

  5. The Vociferous Time Waster

    Rory

    Rory Twitter Jones is a fantastic example of the sort of person who should not be reporting on tech. I recall the days when a journo was expected to have a basic understanding of his field however Rory is just another mac user with Fry scale incompetence whenever he strays too far from the press release he is regurgitating.

  6. Vincent Manis

    `Coding' is such a generic thing, and never should have been identified as a goal. Certainly HTML coding is a good and useful skill (though, to be fair, it's easily automatable, as many web frameworks have shown), but it has little to do with writing programs that accomplish useful things, whether they be things of interest to the individual author, or things of interest to enterprises and the public at large.

    The Raspberry Pi folks don't primarily want to have people coding. They wanted to build something that can be played with, that is as open as possible, to stimulate interest in computer science and engineering. Their metric, as can be seen from their website, is much less `how many people learned to program RPi' than `how many people have done fun/interesting/useful things with the platform'?

    This distinction seems to be very difficult to get across to people. Thirty years ago, I was running workshops on teaching with LOGO. I gave it up after realizing that to most of the participants, the goal of LOGO was not to learn how to solve interesting problems, but to `trick' the turtle into drawing cute pictures.

    I thought it interesting that the timeline presented in the article made no mention of people who were in the business of teaching computer science and engineering. If I were a non-technical politician wanting to set up something like this, I'd have gone out and formed an advisory council with (say) 5 people from academia and 5 from industry (at the CTO level) to chart out a workable strategy. If I were doing that in Britain, Eben Upton would have been one of the first I would have called. So I guess that's why I'm not in politics.

    1. keithpeter Silver badge
      Childcatcher

      Coding' is such a generic thing, and never should have been identified as a goal.

      @ Vincent Manis

      Nailed it here. There are end user 'programs' with which I would include that spreadsheet that the geezer in the corner with the two monitors uses to run everyday things. Bit of a mess, but it works and if you put comments on it and handed it to a professional programmer they might be able to use it as a spec to build something decent.

      Then there are the 'use once and mangle' scripts I write* in R and pyxplot to do stuff.

      Then there are PD patches / Processing sketches used to make art (or noise).

      Finally, there is a considered process for embodying carefully analysed business logic in polished computer programs running with efficient UIs. Those make money either by saving time or by being sold.

      Methinks the children need to start with the fun stuff.

      (*)OK copy/paste and munge. But they work. And run under user rights on a laptop. Nowt mission critical.

      1. oolor

        @ Vincent:

        I concur, further, one could go so far to say that HTML is more like punctuation than programming - though I believe that excellent grammar and language skills will help many future programmers when they deal with syntax in a computer language. Focus on the 3 R's is crucial for success as a programmer. Beyond just helping provide a strong framework within which to explain, attack a problem, and discuss it with others effectively, such focus on 'basic' skills repeated in many small steps along the way builds to way more than trying to teach someone 'how' to code 'properly'.

        @keithpeter:

        The sad thing is that these YoC people are the ones who sell (or at least hang out with those who do) code that make your "use once and mangle" scripts look like a "a considered process".

        I think that the approach you outline is excellent, and quite frankly many smart kids who would otherwise not bother to learn could be exposed enough for them to see they can always learn the details along the way in the future as they work through a problem that requires computing.

        Myself, I only really got going with actively programming as a considered process after I got frustrated trying to plumb together not quite complete libraries that did many great things, but not what I wanted, and not as efficiently. Once I started to think that I could do better, I became more discrete about the context of a problem or a solution and refused to accept solutions (particularly from myself) that were poor.

        On the other hand, I also found that sometimes a simple generalization is more effective than a complicated, but computationally expensive slightly more precise filter in certain constrained autocomplete situations.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          "excellent grammar and language skills will help many future programmers when they deal with syntax in a computer language. Focus on the 3 R's is crucial for success as a programmer."

          Well said.

          May I add a plug for a better understanding of basic logic (if condition-is-true then do-something else do-something-else), and maybe even states and transitions.

    2. Diogenes

      BINGO !

      "Thirty years ago, I was running workshops on teaching with LOGO. I gave it up after realizing that to most of the participants, the goal of LOGO was not to learn how to solve interesting problems, but to `trick' the turtle into drawing cute pictures."

      Have an upvote sir.

      For the last 2 years I have been trying to get low achieving year 8 classes interested in coding. I have tried Scratch, I have tried Alice, I have tried Python, I have tried VB - javascript & even flash (not so much the coding but the animation) nothing & I mean nothing works. BUT when asked they all want to create a first person shooter like COD. (sigh)

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    people who see themselves and their craft as an exclusive band of brethren - journalists?

    'people who see themselves and their craft as an exclusive band of brethren' - was he talking about journalists? Because every time someone says everybody can become a reporter today thanks to the digital world, they say you require a long training and experience to be a true journalist...

  8. disgruntled yank

    Now, really

    To quote Mr. Cellan-Jones:

    "Now it's fair to point out that some of the criticism is mean spirited. There is a minority of older experienced programmers who see themselves and their craft as an exclusive band of brethren and will always be hostile to an initiative like this. A glance at the comments under a YouTube video of Lottie Dexter's Newsnight interview reveals a murky world of misogyny and coding snobbery."

    (My emphasis.) And this is in the fourteenth paragraph of seventeen, with paragraphs two through seven critical of the program or at least its launch.

    1. James Hughes 1

      Re: Now, really

      Thanks Disgruntled Yank for posting what he ACTUALLY SAID - quite amazing how bad the deliberate misquote was here.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Pi

    (somebody's mentioned it already, damn). Where does the Pi layer fit in? They saw the opportunity, they were lead into one? Or was it a coincidence? Or did the Pi-people sell the coding idea to the (still alleged) shovel and pick busybodies?

    and where, if anywhere, does the BBC fit in, as it features heavily in the storyline of yours? Were they enlisted to spread the gospel, and if so, by whom? And as they spread the good word, is there anything to suggest they are aware of their role or do they do so, innocently. In other words, is BBC an accomplice, or a blind tool?

    Sigh, I need a new bag of popcorn (shuffling away in search of one)....

  10. Denarius
    Meh

    Isn't this all

    just an extended Bongonomics article ? Seriously ? However Steve could be humorous, something this series is not.

  11. Lars Silver badge
    Happy

    Reality

    The reality is sometimes more fun than fiction. But why try to mix the Pi into this.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Reality

      "why try to mix the Pi into this."

      You've presumably never heard Eben Upton or colleagues talk about why the Pi Foundation was set up.

      You should have a look.

      It makes "a year of code" look really rather silly. Which, as far as I can tell so far, it is.

  12. JakePepper

    The Coding Frenzy

    I used to be an IT teacher. Before that I taught Computer Studies which consisted of theory and programming in BASIC. The vast majority of kids did not have the ability to "code" in BASIC beyond a very elementary level.

    As a result most kids got bored and lost interest. The few who did have the ability and who were interested produced some wonderful stuff.

    I have the feeling the same thing will happen with the current "coding" frenzy. A small number of kids will be good enough. The rest will fall by the wayside.

    I belive "Coding" should only be available as an option in Year 10 and 11 and on to Sixth Form for those who firstly have the ability and secondly show a genine interest.

    I fear that otherwise the whole initiative will be yet another failure.

    Cheers.

    Jake Pepper

    1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

      Re: The Coding Frenzy @JakePepper

      You have a point, but the issue is identifying the kids who have a genuine interest. It's a chicken-and-egg scenario. unless you get them to try it, many kids won't know that they can do it, so given the choice won't select it as an area of study.

      The main aim of teaching something like BASIC was to find out, using a language that is simple enough so that it can be grasped quite quickly who can de-construct a problem and work out how to get the computer to solve it. Once someone can do this, they can progress to something more complicated.

      Trying to teach any sort of programming is difficult today. 30 years ago, writing Animal, Vegetable or Mineral or Mastermind was a real achievement, but could be done using something like BASIC on your average home PC after some hours of study. People doing it could be proud, and show of their skills.

      Now, you need to be able to do something really flashy with fancy graphics and moving images for anybody to feel like they've achieved anything worthwhile. The step from writing loops with text output to a FPS is so vast, that most kids, who have the attention span of a goldfish, can never make it, and will give up before they've even started.

      I would like to go back to using a simple language like BASIC, for all it's shortcomings, to teach. Get the kids to learn what an integer or string text variable is before trying to teach complex data objects with attached methods. How in hell are they supposed to know how a method is applied to a complex object, if they don't even know that a name in the program represents a quantity/number/string etc. And that is what you get if you try to teach using Java or Python as a first language.

      I admit that it is difficult to get them to see that what they are doing is worthwhile, but the old adage of "Don't run before you can walk" appears to be appropriate here!

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Lottie Dexter is nearly an anagram of Lisp ex-developer. Spooky...

    1. DropBear

      ...as long as "nearly" is defined as "not entirely unlike", sure.

    2. Lyndon Hills 1

      For values of 'nearly' that include not very.

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