Re: Computing Editorial (please read)

[pausch@saaf.se (Paul Schlyter)]

In article <b2dpvo$3p6$1@freenet9.carleton.ca>,
Michael Black <et472@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote:
 
> Paul Schlyter (pausch@saaf.se) writes:
>> In article <qhr8aeut5p.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>,
>> Eric Smith  <eric-no-spam-for-me@brouhaha.com> wrote:
>>  
>>> Lee Hart <leeahart@earthlink.net> writes:
>>>> It wasn't that long ago that there *were* MCUs designed for beginners.
>>>> Thousands of beginners bought them, and used them, and mastered them.
>>>> They became today's computer experts.
>>> 
>>> There have *never* been MCUs "designed for beginners",
>>  
>> Not quite true -- back when MCU's first appeared, nearly *everyone*
>> were beginners in that field....
>
> Yes, and no.  I was going to bring the point up earlier, and went blank
> over "MCU".
> 
> Yes, thirty years ago many people trying out microprocessor based
> computers were new to computers, because suddenly they had computers
> accessible to a far greater extent than previously.  But, I also
> imagine many starting out with them came from a computer background.
 
True, but most had other backgrounds, simply because most of them
didn't have access to computers earlier.
 
> More important, in those early days, while they were new to computers,
> they were in a different space from the average person, often with
> a technical background, be it hobby or professional.  In other
> words, they were in a better position to take on something new.
 
Technically minded persons still exist -- and whenever someone stars
to do embedded programming for the first time, he's a beginner in
that field, even if he's been doing high-level programming on PC's or
Mac's before.  To actually dive into machine language and worry
about clock cycles/etc is definitely a new experience.
 
> I think what some of the comments about no computers (or is it
> CPU's?) for beginners are missing a key point, that back then
> the CPUs and computers weren't necessarily simple for beginners,
> they were simple because that was all there was.  It was right
> at the beginning of a new thing, and everything has to go
> through a number of iterations before it becomes complex.
> 
> Take a KIM-1, really quite simple compared to today's computers.
> There were things in it helpful for someone trying to learn
> about such things.  But unless one was going to pay big money
> for all the extras (memory, video, ascii keyboard), you could
> only stick with something so simple.  And since you didn't have
> the hardware to run fancy programs, that too was out of the picture.
> 
> It only incidentally was helpful in getting people under the hood.
 
I.e. it wasn't really easier before for beginners in microcontroller
programming....
 
Today computers are much more common, and most of today's computer
users would never dive into microcontrollers -- not because of the
lack of beginner-friendly documentation, but because they are just
not interested.  One generation ago, these people wouldn't have been
interested in incrocontrollers either -- the only difference being
that back then, they weren't users of user-friendly computers, simply
because such computers didn't yet exist.
 
-- 
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