Re: [Edu-sig] Python as Application

Wups. Sorry to those also reading tutor@. I always mix up these 2 lists.
My son is learning something about using a spreadsheet - extremely useful and I support it 100%. That he thinks what he is learning is Excel is absolutely unforgivable, in terms of my understanding of ethical norms that once prevailed in an institute of higher education.
I guess it depends on whether that is what he was taught or if he was ever taught about alternatives. If this is an advanced class and was billed as "learn all the details about Excel" that's fine. If this is an introductory course I believe it should really start off with ... Excel is a spreadsheet. There are many spreadsheet applications available. All spreadsheets share these common traits ....
We understand that all the functionality he will ever need from Excel is available for free in other spreadsheet software.
Probably. Anything beyond the common spreadsheet functions is almost certainly better done another way.
Do I care that he is within an institution that has lost its bearings on fundamental matters of academic ethics.
Of course. More frightening to me than the ubiquitous use of MS Office is the omnipresence of windows. Every time a student sits down in front of KDE in our lab and says "Where is the internet?" I can only cringe. Microsoft may not own the internet, but that is not what we are teaching. I seriously get about 10% of users who are unable to see any other browser as performing the same function as internet explorer. If "what is a spreadsheet?" is pretty scary. "What is a browser?" is downright terrifying.
Do I care that I am made to feel that this point of view is somehow radical on a educational forum that is an offshoot of an open source software community.
Hmm... more like "preaching to the choir" isn't it? _________________________________________________________________ Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today it's FREE! http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/

-----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of Lee Harr
If "what is a spreadsheet?" is pretty scary. "What is a browser?" is downright terrifying.
Interesting how they cornered the market. A good browser - costing millions of dollars to development - has a retail value of zero, by the rules of the game set by Microsoft. What is actually amazing is that there remains as much substantial competition as there is, and that this is the first area where Microsoft has shown its vulnerability and began to loose market share. Though I don't fully understand what drives the Mozilla project, for example. Is there a business model there? My best sense is that it is supported by industry sources in a brilliant counter-offensive - delivering the message in concrete terms that Microsoft will *not* realize potentials. Setting the stage for other counter-offensives. This together with the fact that Microsoft has never been technological innovators, but consolidators and packagers who have now driven the innovators away from innovating in any way that is vulnerable to their reach - leaving them with little new to consolidate and package - my investment advise is to short Microsoft.
Do I care that I am made to feel that this point of view is somehow radical on a educational forum that is an offshoot of an open source software community.
Hmm... more like "preaching to the choir" isn't it?
One would think. But my disappointment with the Open Source movement is the extent to which it can be literalist and legalistic. When Alan Kay takes the stage from the Disney pulpit as the educator of the new age, he should be universally be booed off the stage - as a matter of principle, principle being a very practical thing. I don't need to read the Squeak license to know that. Others seem to get distracted by that issue. Art

-----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of Arthur Sent: Friday, October 28, 2005 10:06 AM To: 'Lee Harr'; edu-sig@python.org Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python as Application
When Alan Kay takes the stage from the Disney pulpit as the educator of the new age, he should be universally be booed off the stage - as a matter of principle, principle being a very practical thing. I don't need to read the Squeak license to know that. Others seem to get distracted by that issue.
The point here, BTW, not being that large corporations are evil. The point more being that Kay was presenting Big Ideas about education, but was purposefully developing and presenting them through a delivery mechanism that was an end run around the kind of peer review, debate, countervailing evidence, etc. that his ideas would necessarily (one would think at least) be subject to in an academic setting. The idea of making an end run around review, debate and evidence - call me old fashion - doesn't seem to me like a good idea. Art

-----Original Message----- From: Arthur [mailto:ajsiegel@optonline.net]
The idea of making an end run around review, debate and evidence - call me old fashion - doesn't seem to me like a good idea.
Trying to find my own theme. The recent technological burst of energy has created exciting new possibilities, and, with it - in my view - an overpopulation of MUHs - Men of Unfathomable Hubris. Seems to me we have the possibility of accepting the one, and rejecting the other. Art

The idea of making an end run around review, debate and evidence - call me old fashion - doesn't seem to me like a good idea.
Trying to find my own theme. The recent technological burst of energy has created exciting new possibilities, and, with it - in my view - an overpopulation of MUHs - Men of Unfathomable Hubris.
Seems to me we have the possibility of accepting the one, and rejecting the other.
Art
From this Wikipedia article [1] I went to the streaming video [2], which was
There's nothing to stop academia from commenting upon, debating, field testing Alan Kay's ideas. Just because he's sometimes behind a corporate podium (Xerox, Atari, HP, Apple, Disney) instead of a university one doesn't impress me much, given the highly permeable membrane between private think tanks, research companies, and graduate schools. I reserve the right to stand behind a company podium, if invited to do so by a company I respect. I'd rather *not* have Alan booed off stage, given I'd like to hear what he has to say. Fortunately, given the Internet, it's not a matter of stages, podiums, and obnoxious audiences. I'm able to access the guy's thinking rather more directly: plenty interesting. Synopsis: Developing fluency in math and science is tough fun, like learning a musical instrument, and is what kids need to do to access the somewhat invisible, non-telegenic world of science-minded adults. Computers can help provide this access, for example by making clear the distinction between real mathematics, which is not about anything physical, and the sciences, which use mathematics to investigate and model the physical. They're a great tool for scientific visualization and probing -- but only a tool, reflective of human thought. music:piano :: language:computer. He talks about what a benevolent despot might do to improve education, but acknowledges a top-down approach would be unpalatable in a democracy, and prone to failure anyway. He sees the Internet and personal computers as contributing to a bottom-up approach. Lots of autobio mixed in (an advanced reader early on, alienated by school, with a scientist dad, musician mom, and author granddad with thousands of books). Fun quote (some Englishwoman prodding USAers): "The USA offers the best high school education in the world... too bad you have to go to college to get one." Anyway, I have no intention of pursuing your strategy of vilifying Kay simply on the basis of how he gets his funding, and with almost no discussion of his actual ideas. I do agree with your earlier point, that students shouldn't confuse classes of application (e.g. spreadsheet, word processor, database, browser), with special case implementations or instantiations thereof (e.g. Excel, MySQL). That would seem an easy point to communicate, especially by projecting some examples. Kirby [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Kay [2] http://www.csupomona.edu/%7eitac/mediavision/streaming/tae/alan_kay.html

-----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of Kirby Urner Sent: Saturday, October 29, 2005 4:31 PM To: edu-sig@python.org Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python as Application
There's nothing to stop academia from commenting upon, debating, field testing Alan Kay's ideas. Just because he's sometimes behind a corporate podium (Xerox, Atari, HP, Apple, Disney) instead of a university one doesn't impress me much, given the highly permeable membrane between private think tanks, research companies, and graduate schools.
And family entertainment companies and consumer electronic companies and fast food restaurant chains. And there are no lines to be drawn anywhere? Putting aside the question of whether my concerns are well founded or not, do you see anything to my sense of things that part of the disruption of disruptive technologies has been to move this line significantly beyond where it has once been drawn? Just curious. Art

Putting aside the question of whether my concerns are well founded or not, do you see anything to my sense of things that part of the disruption of disruptive technologies has been to move this line significantly beyond where it has once been drawn?
Just curious.
Art
I'd like edu-sig to be a lot about Python. Doesn't mean we can't discuss "big issues". Scenario: Microsoft realizes IronPython has great potential for recruiting future knowledge workers to the .NET development platform and launches an advertising campaign to that effect, focusing on a few showcase high schools and colleges that have incorporated IronPython into their curricula, thanks to generous grants from Microsoft for teacher training at Microsoft University. Microsoft also boosts the staff and development budget for this product, but continues to use a "Shared Source License" making reference to Microsoft patents.[1] Note that IronPython also runs on Mono on the Linux platform and that IronPython, including source code, remains a free download. Linux developers start seeing ways to write cross-platform Python GUI apps that work much better than before. IronPython also runs faster than CPython in many contexts. Microsoft signs on as a major sponsor for Pycon2008. How do you respond? Kirby [1] http://www.gotdotnet.com/workspaces/License.aspx?id=ad7acff7-ab1e-4bcb-99c0- 57ac5a3a9742

-----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of Kirby Urner
There's nothing to stop academia from commenting upon, debating, field testing Alan Kay's ideas.
Nor is there anything to stop the company with an interest in his ideas from spending a $100 million or so to make sure his ideas get a fair hearing. Where do I get my $100 million to help make sure his ideas do not get *too* fair a hearing. Doesn't matter to you as much as it does to me. It is mystery why not. But that's OK. Art
participants (3)
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Arthur
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Kirby Urner
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Lee Harr