This is ridiculous. I am going to unsubscribe from bug-hurd the next time I see such an off-topic thread again.
Michael On Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 08:24:21AM +0100, Arne Babenhauserheide wrote: > Am Dienstag, 17. November 2009 22:38:39 schrieb olafbuddenha...@gmx.net: > > The problem with learning bit by bit is that you only look up things if > > you want to do something new. You never get a complete picture; you > > never learn how you could do things more efficiently, and/or with better > > result; and you often pick up really bad practices. > > I tend to disagree here, too. > > You do pick up back practise if you only check what is absolutely necessary > to > get the task at hand done (as I often do for shell scripting). > > If you check deeper issues when you need them, you understand something new > and you learn to work more efficiently. > > Look for example at the Mercurial guide I wrote. At first you only learn to > commit and read your log. At that point you already understand that Mercurial > tracks your changes - and after using it a bit, you also get a feeling for > what commit does. > > Then you learn how to do nonlinear development, branching and merging at > will. > Committing is already natural at that point, so you only enhance what you > already know by heart. > > And after that you learn that working together with others is simply > nonlinear > development by exchanging "commits" between repositories. > > > In really complex areas that becomes even more evident. > > One example: I'm studying physics, and I learned this summer with the Feynman > lectures, which hammer home the point that statistics tell us that the > distribution of particles with certain energies is exp(-E/kT) - that's "e" to > the potential of minus the energy divided by the temperature (and the > Boltzmann constant). He explains that for gases at first (energy distribution > in different heights - only from gravity and random movement energy). The > distribution says "this many particles with Energy E are there". > > At that point he never talks about the difference between bose particles and > fermi particles. He also doesn't try to give the whole mechanism, but rather > gives a central part of the whole picture. > > Now when I got to learning suprafluids and stuff, it was quite easy to > understand what their slightly different distribution does: > > 1 / (exp(E/kT) - 1) > > That's almost exp( - E/kT), but for low energies it goes to infinity - > because > the lowest state of a suprafluid can be shared by an arbitrary high number of > particles - if you only manage to take away enough energy from them. That's > why it can crawl over walls, ignores rotations of the container and such. > > To really see the implications of that, you already need to know about , > Heisenbergs uncertainty relation for the gaussian distribution of energies, > quantum mechanics, energy barriers and stuff. But you don't need to > understand > that to grasp the basic law exp(-E/kt). > > And really understanding the basic law makes it much easier to understand > more > complex stuff later on - understanding everything at once is just not > feasible > for the vast majority of physics students. > When you already know exp(-E/kT), many later things are "wow, it's really > easy > to see how that works - just a small alteration to the basic distribution". > > (there are more basic principles in physics than this, but that's one which > currently fascinates me; it is so easy - once you udnerstand it :) > And Feynman really manages to make physics sound as fascinating as it is, > while keeping it easy to understand). > > To organize learning that way makes for a very efficient learning curve. > > (actually he starts with "all matter is made of atoms (as long as we don't > look to deep)" and "we begin with small lies which make it easier to > understand the basics - but we tell you which laws are final (to our current > knowledge) and which are simplifications we'll have to revise" and goes > onward > from that). > > > In either case, you can't seriously argue that it's demanding too much, > > that everyone learning how to set the text color, should also learn how > > to set the background color at the same time, and vice versa... > > And the button color, and the text field color (almost no site changes that), > ... > > What's missing there is a way to adapt to user settings. What you describe is > binary again: Either set all or nothing. But that means that it doesn't > integrate at all or integrates completely - without middle ground. > > But we already had that part of the discussion... > > Best wishes, > Arne > > PS: I think that this can be relevant to the Hurd, because the learning curve > is something which also affects every program, translator usage, etc. - and > so > it affects how easy it is for people to switch to the Hurd.
