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0 pointse12e9y ago0 comments

I was actually suggest Racket as a great platform for learning programming (it's a "real" language/platform, decent IDE, support for building stand-alone executables, great documentation, sold cross-platform support) - but was a little surprised that I couldn't find a BASIC #lang-uage extension for Racket. It would seem that a BASIC mode and maybe a pure turtle graphics mode should be pretty trivial to make for Racket.

Not that scheme is a terrible language.

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sn99y ago

Racket has turtle graphics. [0]

Realm of Racket might be a good non-school introduction to programming. [1] I feel like How to Design Programs would be better suited for the classroom, whereas RoR is all about having fun.

[0] https://docs.racket-lang.org/turtles/

[1] https://www.nostarch.com/realmofracket

e12eOP9y ago

As far as I can gather, that module doesn't support traditional (non-lisp) syntax, along the lines of traditional logo graphics? Which could be why the tutorial section[1] prefers the (apparently more well documented) "#lang slideshow", which gives some of the same benefits (a simple syntax for graphics) with some of the same [ed: drawbacks] (an IMNHO slightly higher bar for entry, due to being Scheme, rather than an even easier language).

[1] https://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/

[ed: Ie: one can't simply cut'n'paste from: http://el.media.mit.edu/logo-foundation/what_is_logo/logo_pr... and get pretty pictures, one has to manually compile (or transpile if you will) from Logo to Scheme first. Which is obviously a job for a computer, not for a brain.]

mzs9y ago

Racket is a very nice scheme setup. As a SICPer I initially wondered if I should use a scheme variant for my oldest son but I thought back to my youth and decided against it. in HS I wrote a TP program that plotted functions for my math class. It would run through the line entered looking for whitespace operators like * and + and only keywords like sin before (. Then it would write a .BAS file and run it in qbasic to plot ;) Having later taken SICP in first year CS was mind opening regarding REPL, but I really appreciated having that earlier experience and honestly I needed a certain maturity for the mental abstractness. There's a time for scheme, about the time someone is ready for learning calculus.

e12eOP9y ago

Sure. But there's no reason one couldn't start with a BASIC-like language in Racket. Someone would just have to implement it and support it. It's crazy powerful, see eg:

"Creating Languages in Racket - Sometimes you just have to make a better mousetrap." http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=2068896j

nickpsecurity9y ago

I originally started with BASIC, created a 4GL with it for productivity, discovered LISP, and re-implemented BASIC in it for incremental compilation & macros. So, yes it's doable. :)

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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sn99y ago

Racket has turtle graphics. [0]

Realm of Racket might be a good non-school introduction to programming. [1] I feel like How to Design Programs would be better suited for the classroom, whereas RoR is all about having fun.

[0] https://docs.racket-lang.org/turtles/

[1] https://www.nostarch.com/realmofracket

e12eOP9y ago

[1] https://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/

mzs9y ago

e12eOP9y ago

Sure. But there's no reason one couldn't start with a BASIC-like language in Racket. Someone would just have to implement it and support it. It's crazy powerful, see eg:

"Creating Languages in Racket - Sometimes you just have to make a better mousetrap." http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=2068896j

nickpsecurity9y ago

I originally started with BASIC, created a 4GL with it for productivity, discovered LISP, and re-implemented BASIC in it for incremental compilation & macros. So, yes it's doable. :)

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse