Official SICP/Scheme Study Group Registration (up. 1/26)
Author
After discussing it for a little while, we will really be starting soon. This thread is to let people know this and to get a general feeling of who will be involved.
We will be studying the online book Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (SICP), which uses a dialect of Lisp called Scheme. If you are interested please reply with your information below.
Update: see this post for up-to-date info about the group. We are still alive! Please feel free to join. To current members, lets keep it up!
Here are some links for SICP:
SICP (book)
Lectures
Lecture Notes
(thanks Reindeer Effect)
(Following is old)
The general format will be this (and this may change over the course of the study, this is to just get things started):
- Every week there will be a thread that outlines the current week's lesson and what to do. Students/mentors will reply to this thread with answers and questions.
- We will have an IRC channel where informal meetings can take place but in general be a place where hopefully a couple people will constantly be. Still kind of fleshing out how this will work.
Edit: if any mod is reading this, I'd like to have an OK that we'll have an offical thread every week? Is it possible to make the thread for the current week a sticky?
(end old stuff)
We will start next week with Chapter 1, "Building Abstractions with Procedures". We'll probably then take Thanksgiving week off and then continue after that.
Please reply with the following:
Name:
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student | Mentor | Somewhat both
My experience with Scheme is:
My experience with general programming is:
Timezone:
I will be updating this list as people reply. This from the thread before this.
This list is just for our own sake, to make sure we got enough people to make this work. People are free to still join once the group has started.
Me:
Name: Okonomiyaki
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student
My experience with Scheme is: Little, writing square root solver
My experience with general programming is: Experienced, long time working with C++ with some Perl, Python, and other scripting
Timezone: US Eastern (GMT -5)
--
Study group members:
Rebooted (possible mentor/leader)
thebolt00 (possible mentor/leader)
Roboguy (possible mentor/leader)
chollida1 (possible mentor/leader)
some Anonymous Poster (possible mentor/leader)
SamLowry (possible mentor/leader)
Muhammad Haggag (possible mentor/leader)
The Reindeer Effect mentor
Alpha_ProgDes
GPX
DeadXorAlive
Ezbez
Tynnhammar
Okonomiyaki
joanusdmentia
XXX_Andrew_XXX
Telastyn
visage
Xloner12
CTar
samv
David Tynnhammar
Ceoddyn
DaBookshah
programwizard
Daerax
@root
lXciD
Diodor
codingdaemon
kevtimc
EmrldDrgn
GameDev Doctor
aceofspaceman
[Edited by - okonomiyaki on January 26, 2007 4:50:14 PM]
Name: XXX_Andrew_XX
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student
My experience with Scheme is: I've watched the SICP lectures and done a little porting of AI lisp code to python.
My experience with general programming is: high, C/C++/Python/Ada for a wide range of projects
Timezone: Eastern Summer Time Australia (GMT +10)
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student
My experience with Scheme is: I've watched the SICP lectures and done a little porting of AI lisp code to python.
My experience with general programming is: high, C/C++/Python/Ada for a wide range of projects
Timezone: Eastern Summer Time Australia (GMT +10)
Just a thought, but perhaps the lessons should be extended to two weeks? Even the C++ workshop seemed to move too fast for many and now that most of the students will be full time students or professionals instead of teens off for the summer, more time might be nice.
Telastyn
part-time/non-dedicated student
I downloaded a compiler once and have the briefest of introductions to functional programming.
~10 years, mostly informal.
Central US
Telastyn
part-time/non-dedicated student
I downloaded a compiler once and have the briefest of introductions to functional programming.
~10 years, mostly informal.
Central US
I think it might be a good idea to write a short conceptual introduction to what functional programming entails and how it is different from imperative style. Failure to grasp this (there are OTHER ways of writing programs than as sequences of assignments) leads to pain, as Alpha_ProgDes and others have illustrated in the past when they tried to tackle SICP.
Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
Quote:Original post by Anonymous Poster
I think it might be a good idea to write a short conceptual introduction to what functional programming entails and how it is different from imperative style. Failure to grasp this (there are OTHER ways of writing programs than as sequences of assignments) leads to pain, as Alpha_ProgDes and others have illustrated in the past when they tried to tackle SICP.
It's good to know you haven't forgotten about me [lol]
Quote:Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So true. As said above, I learned that the hard way.
Quote:So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
(Agreed)2
Quote:Original post by Anonymous Poster
I think it might be a good idea to write a short conceptual introduction to what functional programming entails and how it is different from imperative style. Failure to grasp this (there are OTHER ways of writing programs than as sequences of assignments) leads to pain, as Alpha_ProgDes and others have illustrated in the past when they tried to tackle SICP.
Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
That's a good point, which is why I suggested that people start out by reading The little Schemer first.
It's nice that someone would take time out of their day to write a tutorial on functional programming but the little schemer is about 200 hundred pages and they had 2 follow up books because they couldn't properly describe the gist of functional programming in that space.
Cheers
Chris
Hopefully I can participate...
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student
My experience with Scheme is: None
My experience with general programming is: C/C++/Java/Ruby/SML
Timezone: EST (GMT -5)
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student
My experience with Scheme is: None
My experience with general programming is: C/C++/Java/Ruby/SML
Timezone: EST (GMT -5)
Quote:Original post by chollida1Quote:Original post by Anonymous Poster
I think it might be a good idea to write a short conceptual introduction to what functional programming entails and how it is different from imperative style. Failure to grasp this (there are OTHER ways of writing programs than as sequences of assignments) leads to pain, as Alpha_ProgDes and others have illustrated in the past when they tried to tackle SICP.
Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
That's a good point, which is why I suggested that people start out by reading The little Schemer first.
It's nice that someone would take time out of their day to write a tutorial on functional programming but the little schemer is about 200 hundred pages and they had 2 follow up books because they couldn't properly describe the gist of functional programming in that space.
Cheers
Chris
Is the The Little Schemer free and online? Right now, I'm broke...
I'm looking forward to this, I hope I can follow.
Name: Lutger.
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student.
My experience with Scheme is: A little from my first attempt at SICP before I got distracted
My experience with general programming is: novice. C++, D and a little python.
Timezone: GMT+1
Okonomiyaki, do you mean one week for Chapter 1? That might be a bit much, it's pretty dense stuff. From the preface I gathered that the first 3 or 4 chapter's are worth a full semester course. Will we be doing the whole thing?
Name: Lutger.
I am interested in joining the group as a: Student.
My experience with Scheme is: A little from my first attempt at SICP before I got distracted
My experience with general programming is: novice. C++, D and a little python.
Timezone: GMT+1
Okonomiyaki, do you mean one week for Chapter 1? That might be a bit much, it's pretty dense stuff. From the preface I gathered that the first 3 or 4 chapter's are worth a full semester course. Will we be doing the whole thing?
Author
Quote:Original post by Alpha_ProgDesQuote:Original post by chollida1Quote:Original post by Anonymous Poster
I think it might be a good idea to write a short conceptual introduction to what functional programming entails and how it is different from imperative style. Failure to grasp this (there are OTHER ways of writing programs than as sequences of assignments) leads to pain, as Alpha_ProgDes and others have illustrated in the past when they tried to tackle SICP.
Presumably, many students will have prior programming experience with imperative languages only, which is annoying for them because they'll try to write C-style scheme and do worse than the absolute beginners.
So I'll try to whip up a short primer on the conceptual underpinnings of FP and imperative style tomorrow, with plenty of examples, and submit it for comment and review. Forewarned is forearmed, and much frustration may be avoided I think if we can get students to understand this early on.
That's a good point, which is why I suggested that people start out by reading The little Schemer first.
It's nice that someone would take time out of their day to write a tutorial on functional programming but the little schemer is about 200 hundred pages and they had 2 follow up books because they couldn't properly describe the gist of functional programming in that space.
Cheers
Chris
Is the The Little Schemer free and online? Right now, I'm broke...
Yeah, and we're not talking about a full in-depth tutorial either. I just read Chapter 1 to SICP and I feel like it's pretty good introduction, but I agree with AP. A short, succint, ~5 paragraph intro to functional programming would be really nice for people who've never done it before. It could especially outline what to watch out for if you are used to imperitave programming. Just something quick.
AP, thanks for doing that!! Post it here when you are finished I guess. We can include it in the first thread.
Telastyn: you may be right. The chapters were a little bit longer than I thought because there's a LOT on each page. We could push it to a chapter each 2 weeks, any nayers?
Quote: by DeadXorAlive
Okonomiyaki, do you mean one week for Chapter 1? That might be a bit much, it's pretty dense stuff. From the preface I gathered that the first 3 or 4 chapter's are worth a full semester course. Will we be doing the whole thing?
So it's seconded. We'll need to find a good pace because some people are going to get hooked and read sections in advance, but there will be others who take it slower. Personally I think I'm going to fall in love with it and advance through it pretty quickly, but if others want to take it slower that's fine with me.
We can have variable time lengths. Reading through the first chapter was quick for me because I felt like I was reading the same boilerplate again. But I'd definitely want to spend more time on chapters 4 and 5.
How does 2 weeks for the first chapter sound then?
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