Most of that article is rendered moot with this section:
"Now, I freely admit that programming with pointers is not needed in 90% of the code written today, and in fact, it's downright dangerous in production code. OK. That's fine. And functional programming is just not used much in practice. Agreed.
But it's still important for some of the most exciting programming jobs."
Pretty much saying that everything he just spoke to us is purely for the "exciting programming jobs". And let's face it, most of us do not have that unless we go out of our way to pigeon hole business problems into being fun and exciting.
Yes it's funny, these places are teaching Python for the same reason they taught Java: it's "easy" and will get you a job. Yet we slate Java-schools, and cheer Python because it's trendy.
The truth is, universities shouldn't care what industry does, because "real-world" computing is more about fashion than it is about any sort of science. And if you do it right people can learn any language they need (case in point, I learnt FORTRAN at college, now I do Python for a living and OCaml as a hobbyist).
Yes it's funny, these places are teaching Python for the same reason they taught Java
That's not what I'm seeing at all. What I'm seeing is discussion of specific traits about Python that make it especially suited for a beginner language. And I'm seeing these arguments made over and over and over again, convincingly, in a way that was NEVER done for Java.
If these Python classes were given to an industrial engineer or a chemistry major who just needs enough programming knowledge to crunch numbers/create scripts I would definitely get the approach and agree with it.
However, if you want your Computer Science majors to be able to create the next runtime like the JVMs, .NETs etc. or be able to do some device programming they need to learn C/C++.
A decade after going through a top-tier CS undergraduate program what saddens me is that a lot of university students today, think that Computer Science is cobbling github sourced code with their choice of scripting language. Yes, the startup market is hot and sometimes that's all you need but CS is much more than that. CS is about understanding the underlying models and concepts rather than a language. If you are totally missing how memory management is done, how data structures are laid out in memory, how typing works you are missing a big chunk of code-base out there in the world today.
I think the new wave of CS students, who are expected to solve larger problems, need to understand how billions of devices/apps are running in today's technology so they can create something better in the future.
"However, if you want your Computer Science majors to be able to create the next runtime like the JVMs, .NETs etc. or be able to do some device programming they need to learn C/C++."
98% of all developers don't actually need to write the next JVM, or .NET or something.
"think that Computer Science is cobbling github sourced code with their choice of scripting language."
This is the beauty of programming, and I'm sorry you can't appreciate that. Not everyone is willing to stab themselves in the eyeball trying to re-implement the .NET/JVM wheel or other low-level library.
It's the same reason the majority of us don't write assembler anymore. We've moved on and abstracted away from that arcane knowledge. Does that mean that arcane knowledge is irrelevant? For most of us, yes. For others, no.
"Yes, the startup market is hot and sometimes that's all you need but CS is much more than that. CS is about understanding the underlying models and concepts rather than a language."
Meanwhile, in the real world, CS is not really necessary for most business problems. No matter how much you wish to romanticize it as a discipline.
CS is about understanding the underlying models and concepts rather than a language.
Programming Language implementations are exploratory tools critical to understanding those underlying models and concepts. Indeed, in my experience the "CS is about understanding the concepts" logic is more often than not used as an excuse NOT to teach C.
Having recruited 3 dozen interns/jr.programmers from schools in the tri-state area and overseas in the past 5-6 years, you would be amazed how many students don't get these basics.
Those schools actually DO try to teach students about these concepts. How do I know? I personally have spoken to the deans of CS departments. Now imagine these same students, who no longer even hear of concepts such as garbage collection, pointers, etc. because it just works in their chosen language.
I believe the era of a single language for your career is long gone. Most people in their 20s and even 30s today will go through at least 4-5 different languages throughout their career.
Personally, I learned and enjoyed C++ 15 years ago but I do not find it practical for anything I do today. However, the same "impractical" knowledge allows me to get familiarized with a new language in a few weeks and start producing working software.
I don't quite care what language students learn as long as the concepts are understood. However, if the language they first start with hides most of these fundamental concepts, they no longer have any incentive to even learn how anything works.
My first language was Basic (in 1982). The second was assembly.
This is not terribly different than what I suggest. I'm saying in the modern world, Python fills the role of Basic and C fills the role of assembly.
The abstract idea is:
First Language: Clean and simple, to introduce the very idea of coding algorithms for a computer.
Step two: Low-level language requiring a lot of attention to detail. Should be useful for exploring low-level details about computer architecture as well as writing real programs.
Notably: Java doesn't fit very well into either category. There's a lot of overhead for pure beginners, and too many layers between the programmer and the hardware
"Now, I freely admit that programming with pointers is not needed in 90% of the code written today, and in fact, it's downright dangerous in production code. OK. That's fine. And functional programming is just not used much in practice. Agreed.
But it's still important for some of the most exciting programming jobs."
Pretty much saying that everything he just spoke to us is purely for the "exciting programming jobs". And let's face it, most of us do not have that unless we go out of our way to pigeon hole business problems into being fun and exciting.