Newsgroups: comp.lang.scheme
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From: smcl@sytex.com (Scott McLoughlin)
Subject: Re: Is scheme a good novice language?
Message-ID: <m2R6uc2w165w@sytex.com>
Sender: bbs@sytex.com
Organization: Sytex Access Ltd.
References: <396u1e$clt@Venus.mcs.com>
Date: Wed, 2 Nov 1994 10:23:21 GMT
Lines: 41

dcarmich@MCS.COM (GrimJack) writes:

> Is scheme a good "novice" language? I want to go beyond BASIC.
> 
> 

Howdy,
        Yes. Scheme is a good novice language. A novice can
learn alot about programming using Scheme. There are some
great intro to programming books that use Scheme as the
language. Scheme is safe, so while you learn about powerful
data structures + algorithms, you won't crash your machine
when you screw up. Some Scheme's provide nice stepping/
breakpoint/debugging facillities for watching your code
"go".
        Also, there are free Scheme implementations that
run on most boxes, including ones you might have "at home".
        Problem: most free Schemes don't provide some of
the "fun" stuff a novice might enjoy, like access to 
sound and graphics primitives or access to the GUI 
facillities provided by Macintosh (not my deal - ?)
or Windows machines or even access to low level screen
i/o primitives for coding up text GUI's.  When I was a
novice, playing around with these types of facillities
kept me interested as I gradually waded deeper into
the hard stuff (spoon full of sugar, and all that).
        But still, I highly recommend Scheme. It is
a straightforward language powerful enough to easily
implement "real" algorithms but safe enough that you
don't worry about crashing your machine or what the
word size is or other stuff that gets in the way of
the algorithm. This is one of its primary strengths
as a programming language.
        At some point you'll probably want to 
twiddle bits and bytes: give C/ASM/Pascal a try. Or
try Forth for a different perspective.

=============================================
Scott McLoughlin
Conscious Computing
=============================================
