[LUAU] Re: Hosef

Jim Thompson jim at netgate.com
Thu Nov 10 17:09:54 PST 2005


Hawaii Linux Institute wrote:

> Tim Newsham wrote:
>
>> I always thought that python should be taught to young students 
>> (elementary, high school, first year college or non-cs college 
>> interested in programming).  Its fairly "clean" and easy to learn and 
>> use without having a deep understanding of programming.  I showed my 
>> wife, who is not technically inclined, a few things and she got it 
>> pretty quickly.  Its still fairly new though and I wonder how many 
>> teachers who teach this class of student knows about it.
>>
>> I think it would be great if HOSEF could play some role in pushing 
>> this kind of knowledge to teachers who could then have an impact on 
>> young minds.
>
> I think everyone will look down at what I am going to say, but I feel 
> obligated to mention it.
>
> The programming skill that is most critically needed is, hold your 
> breath, StarBasic (or any Visual Basic equivalent that works with 
> OpenOffice.org).
>
> If we want our hope of migration from Microsoft Office to 
> OpenOffice.org (& eventually from Windows to Linux) to have any chance 
> of success (& to help Massachusetts' brave move to standardize on 
> ODF), we will need an army of professional as well as amateur 
> StarBasic programmers who can, at least initially, efficiently convert 
> Office macros to OOo equivalents.  Of course, when the skill level 
> elevates, we can further talk about embedding python, MySQL, or even 
> plone scripts into OOo via UNO bridges.
>
> I am trying to help a couple of non-profit legal clinics to switch to 
> OOo/StarOffice.  Lack of StarBasic programmers is the most determining 
> bottleneck.   Wayne


<BONK> <BONK> <BONK>

That was the sound of my head dribbling on the desk.  Ow!

We only need "StarBasic" if you insist that we need to replicate/replace 
the "Visual Basic for Applications" crapfest found in Microsoft Office.

We don't want to migrate people from one office suite to another, we 
want to *transcent* the office suite.   You can't take-on Microsoft 
head-on.  That way likes madness (and a bruised, flat forehead).

The (used to) teach Logo to kids.   No reason to rot their minds with 
the taffy of Basic.   (Please God no, not another generation of Basic 
addicts.)

Jim




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