TITLE: Knowing Context Gives You Power, Both To Choose And To Make
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: March 03, 2022  2:22 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:

 We are at the point in my programming languages course where my
 students have learned a little Racket, a little functional
 programming, and a little recursive programming over inductive
 datatypes.  Even though I've been able to connect many of the
 ideas we've studied to programming tasks out in the world that
 they care about themselves, a couple of students have asked,
 "Why are we doing this again?"

 This is a natural question, and one I'm asked every time I teach
 this course.  My students think that they will be heading out
 into the world to build software in Java or Python or C, and
 the ideas we've seen thus far seem pretty far removed from the
 world they think they will live in.

 These paragraphs from
<a href="https://chelseatroy.com/2018/08/16/api-design-part-3-graphql-and-the-future/">
 near the end</a>
 of Chelsea Troy's 3-part essay on API design do a nice job of
 capturing one part of the answer I give my students:

<blockquote><em>
 This is just one example to make a broader point: it is worthwhile
 for us as technologists to cultivate knowledge of the context
 surrounding our tools so we can make informed decisions about when
 and how to use them.  In this case, we've managed to break down
 some web request protocols and build their pieces back up into a
 hybrid version that suits our needs.
</em></blockquote>

<blockquote><em>
 When we understand where technology comes from, we can more
 effectively engage with its strengths, limitations, and use cases.
 We can also pick and choose the elements from that technology that
 we would like to carry into the solutions we build today.
</em></blockquote>

 The languages we use were designed and developed in a particular
 context.  Knowing that context gives us multiple powers.  One
 power is the ability to make informed decisions about the
 languages -- and language features -- we choose in any given
 situation.  Another is the ability to make new languages, new
 features, and new combinations of features that solve the problem
 we face today in the way that works best in our current context.

 Not knowing context limits us to our own experience.  Troy does
 a wonderful job of demonstrating this using the history of web
 API practice.  I hope my course can help students choose tools
 and write code more effectively when they encounter new languages
 and programming styles.

 Computing changes.  My students don't really know what world they
 will be working in in five years, or ten, or thirty.  Context is
 a meta-tool that will serve them well.
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