TITLE: Programming Feels Like Home
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: February 18, 2020  4:00 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:
 I saw Robin Sloan's
<A HREF="https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/#cooking-at-home">
   An App Can Be a Home-Cooked Meal</A>
 floating around Twitter a few days back.  It really is quite good;
 give it a read if you haven't already.  This passage captures a lot
 of the essay's spirit in only a few words:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 The exhortation "learn to code!" has its foundations in market
 value.  "Learn to code" is suggested as a way up, a way out.
 "Learn to code" offers economic leverage, a squirt of power.
 "Learn to code" goes on your resume.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 But let's substitute a different phrase: "learn to cook."  People
 don't only learn to cook so they can become chefs.  Some do!  But
 far more people learn to cook so they can eat better, or more
 affordably, or in a specific way.  Or because they want to carry
 on a tradition.  Sometimes they learn just because they're bored!
 Or even because -- get this -- they love spending time with the
 person who's teaching them.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

 Sloan expresses better than I ever have an idea that I blog about
 every so often.  Why should people learn to program?  Certainly
 it offers a path to economic gain, and that's why a lot of
 students study computer science in college, whether as a major, a
 minor, or a high-leverage class or two.  There is nothing wrong
 with that.  It is for many a way up, a way out.

 But for some of us, there is more than money in programming.  It
 gives you a certain power over the data and tools you use.  I
 write here occasionally about how a small script or a relatively
 small program makes my life so much easier, and I feel bad for
 colleagues who are stuck doing drudge work that I jump past.
 Occasionally I'll try to share my code, to lighten someone else's
 burden, but most of the time there is such a mismatch between the
 worlds we live in that they are happier to keep plugging along.
 I can't say that I blame them.  Still, if only they could program
 and used tools that enabled them to improve their work environments...

 But... There is more still.  From
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2006-12.html#e2006-12-02T10_42_40.htm">
   the early days of this blog</A>,
 I've been open with you all:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 Here's the thing.  I like to write code.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

 One of the things that students like about my classes is that I love
 what I do, and they are welcome to join me on the journey.  Just
 today a student in my Programming Languages drifted back to my
 office with me after class , where we ended up talking for half an
 hour and sketching code on a whiteboard as we deconstructed a
 vocabulary choice he made on our latest homework assignment.  I
 could sense this student's own love of programming, and it raised
 my spirits.  It makes me more excited for the rest of the semester.

 I've had people come up to me at conferences to say that the reason
 they read my blog is because they like to see someone enjoying
 programming as much as they do.  many of them share links with
 their students as if to say, "See, we are not alone."  I look
 forward to days when I will be able to write in this vein more often.

 Sloan reminds us that programming can be -- is -- more than a line
 on a resume.  It is something that everyone can do, and want to do,
 for a lot of different reasons.  It would be great if programming
 "were marbled deeply into domesticity and comfort, nerdiness and
 curiosity, health and love" in the way that cooking is.  That is
 what makes Computing for All <B>really</B> worth doing.
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