TITLE: Father, Forgive Me
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: February 21, 2008  7:37 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:
... though I can't in good conscience say, "for I know not what
I do."

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
1.  Write a script named </EM><TT>simple-interest.php</TT><EM>
that defines a function to compute the simple interest on an
amount, given the amount, annual interest rate, and number of
months.  Your script should apply the function to its command-line
arguments, which are those same values.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

The rest of my PHP class's first homework is more reasonable,
with a couple of problems repeated from the bash class's first
assignment as a way for students to get a sense of trade-offs
between shell programming and scripting in a more general-purpose
language.

Still, I had to squeeze my eyes shut tight to hit the key that
published this assignment.  I keep telling myself that this is
just an ice-breaking assignment for students who have never
written any PHP before, or learned how to access command-line
arguments, or convert strings to integers.  That such a simple,
context-free task is a nice way for them to succeed on their
first effort.  That our future assignments will be engaging,
challenging, worthwhile.  But...  Ick.

The first time I teach a course, there always seem to be clunkers
like this.  Starting from scratch, relying on textbooks for
inspiration, and working under time pressure all work against
my goal of making everything students do in the class worth their
time and energy.  I suppose that problems such as this one are
my opportunities to improve next time out.

My despair notwithstanding, I suspect that many students are
happy enough to have at least one problem that is a gift,
however uninteresting it may be.  Maybe I can find solace in
that while I'm working on exercises for my next problem set.
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