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I just ran my first CoderDojo on the Sunshine Coast[^] today.
30 kids, a handful of mentors, and a couple of hours of programming fun!
it was surprising, to me, that the majority of the kids had no programming experience whatsoever - these were kids from about 7 through to 14 or so.
we used Scratch mainly - it's a great way of getting them doing something quickly.
A couple of the older kids looked at html and javascript and one played with Python.
considering these kids had to come in on a saturday (it's nothing to do with the school, this is entirely independent) it's amazingly popular - sold out in hours and we're arranging another three events (each is 6 weekly two=hour session) which are essentially already fully booked.
I'm feeling inspired!
PooperPig - Coming Soon
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You can always take a look at LEGO MINDSTORMS and other more advanced robotic platforms, then they learn to program with the prize of something that moves which is more visual.
Years ago I saw this happening when I hired a guy whose hobby was about line following robotics. Being young fellas, we started working on his robot during the weekends and we enjoyed it a lot. It was really nice to work on those platforms using C and applying mechanics, electronics and software to get something really cool.
See here a video of our robot one day we changed the steering control software from a normal direct control to some kind of PID. Oh, and we changed the wheels to make it much more interesting (those wheels slipped a lot).
You can see the video here: http://www.exabyteinformatica.com/tienda/foro/robot-velocista-seguidor-de-linea-en-derrape-constante-t307.html[^]
And the robotics final summary in one of the championships we participated (and win  ) Robolot 2008:
http://www.exabyteinformatica.com/tienda/foro/resumen-rastreadores-velocistas-robolot-2008-t310.html[^]
Our robot can be seen from 2:29 on the left table and 4:07 on the right table (final).
It is fun, it keeps children and not children interested, it's competition and it's great for learning...
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How rewarding! You should be proud!
I may be dating myself, but it made me marvel at the resources that are available to anyone with the desire to learn software development either as a hobby or career. By resources, I mean those things that weren't around when I was a kid:
0: Easy access to a decent computer/device
1: Free IDEs for building applications
2: Easy to find code samples, documentation, tutorials, knowledge base, user community, etc..
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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kmoorevs wrote: I may be dating myself
Obligatory Dilbert[^]
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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Enjoyed the Dilbert, thanks!
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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In stackoverflow, if a new one asks a simple question, then the top users starts down voting, ranting.
If someone don't have knowledge on particular topic or another then the regular users start insulting them.
They call themselves as experts.
They are playing with site good reputation.
Overall this website has became very funny.
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Exactly, you're hundred percent correct. Developers who go to Stack Overflow to get help are often pissed off, when I started to use SO, same thing happened. I asked a question, instead of forwarding me to another thread they downvoted me and then I lost the ability to ask again.
It happens many times. Experts there are experts only because they know how to extract content from Wikipedia or MDN etc and then post code there and make fun of the new developers.
I don't agree that this is the standard of being a developer. A developer always look forward to help not to piss off newbies.
If they're so curious about their database size then they should not let anyone use it at all. People have Wikipedia and more over websites for each programming language, that had a forum made up of actual programmers. Who really know how to help. People like newbies are always pissed off on SO. Its more like just a professional q&a site not programming enthusiasts.
Favourite line: Throw me to them wolves and close the gate up. I am afraid of what will happen to them wolves - Eminem
~! Firewall !~
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I have never had any issue on SO. Most of the downvoted questions that I have seen have been because OP asked a question that is covered by 10 other previous posts, did not show any work, is vague, or is asking for recommendations that are often going to be biased.
If, however, you do research and ensure that there are no other answers on SO that fit your situation, AND you create a well written post that shows what you have done, shows where you are having the problem, explains what you THINK is going on, etc, it will get answered.
I have found that if I write my post, and look at the right hand pane there are a bunch of suggestions, and often I have found my answer there without posting, maybe 10 our of 15 times.
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You've never had any issue? Well you clearly have not used it enough then. Pandu's mentioned problem is very real, but is compounded by the oligarchic design of the site. The authors and moderators argue that it helps to keep the content "pure" and reduces the garbage content, but it's an outdated very unfriendly methodology that punishes naive users who don't deserve to be punished, and in many cases prevents useful knowledge from being captured just because it doesn't meet the overlords' idealistic view of what the site should be.
You can't change a vote after you've voted. You can't edit your own comment after 5 minutes. You can't delete a question if it has answers. Rules like this hurt the quality of a crowdsourced website, they don't improve it.
Stack Overflow is an incredibly valuable resource. But it's valuable despite its horribly restrictive and big brotherish design, not because of it.
Sad but true: 4/3 of Americans have difficulty with simple fractions.
There are 10 types of people in this world: those who understand binary and those who don't.
{o,o}.oO( Check out my blog! )
|)””’) http://pihole.org/
-”-”-
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I have used it quite a bit. I have 3500 rep, have answered 195 questions and asked 65 of my own. I have been downvoted before, a few times rightfully so, a few times without explanation. As with any community there are bad apples who will downvote someone for no real reason, and there are others who, due to the lack of tone on the internet perceive an incorrect tone in a post and downvote for that. I will admit that there is an English bias on the site and non-native speakers who do not make themselves clearly understood have a hard time, and are unfortunately downvoted because of it. I will also admit that I have seen some downvoting issues that were unwarranted, and they were dealt with through reversion.
Most of the cases of downvote oblivion that I have seen were from people posting a simple explanation of a problem with no background, no code, no evidence that they have done anything to solve it themselves and then they demand answers.
My first question, when I had no rep, got downvoted, I used the experience to better my question and I received a thoughtful and educational answer because of it, and an upvote which made a bit of an improvement (downvotes cost 2 rep, upvotes give 10 rep IIRC). The site has worked wonderfully for me.
Now, my question is, any of you who say the site sucks, have you gone on Meta-Stackoverflow and voiced your concerns? What was the outcome? While I am not personal friends with the moderators of either site, they have listened to my concerns in the past and I am not a power-user or top contributor.
The above is not meant to put you on the defensive. I am not attacking you. I genuinely want to know, because I frequent the site, and want to know specifics in an effort to make it better.
Lastly, you can change a vote. I have done it myself not two minutes ago (as a test). Questions with answers can be deleted but the deletion has to be voted on. And I don't see how not being able to edit a comment detracts from the quality of the site. It keeps people accountable for what they say to a certain degree. 5 minutes is enough time to read 500 characters to ensure that it was punctuated and spelled correctly and is grammatically correct, and after that if you called someone a jackass it's there and can't be taken back.
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Well, there are experts there. The hard thing is getting them to answer your questions. Basically they're a QA site that hates questions and the people who ask them. Their anti-OP mentality is copied straight from 4chan, or worse - on 4chan OP is a faggot and should kill himself, but on SO OP is an idiot for even having a question in the first place and doubly so far daring to ask it.
I have over 10k rep there but I haven't asked a question in a long time. Too dangerous.
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And it's even worse if you answer them.
Correct or contradict one of the "top dogs" and you get downvoted, your answer disappears, and the original post magically changes to include yours! Amazing - but not friendly.
Mind you, if I get many more comparisons with Chuck Norris I may have to move over there out of sheer embarrassment... 
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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So pick another person to continue the Chuck Norris theme. May I suggest Marc Clifton?
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or Maxx?
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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PooperPig - Coming Soon
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How about Luc?
A Coding God if ever I saw one.
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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or Kent Sharkey?
he had good one-liners. 
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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Exactly, I totally agree with you. SO only allows perfect answers. Anything that has even a partial problem, like I was to write document.write("Ok!") people would downvote, why are you writing this to the entire document? Just write it in the required element. Even I was just trying to help, I get more than 5 downvotes! -_- You serious? 
Favourite line: Throw me to them wolves and close the gate up. I am afraid of what will happen to them wolves - Eminem
~! Firewall !~
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I never tried SO. They discriminate newbies, so I have a feeling that they will discriminate women more. 
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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I wouldn't say they were sexist.
Rude, arrogate, and elitist, yes. But I've never seen them discriminate against women specifically. They are probably too busy discriminating against everybody else...
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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That's just women's instincts.
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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Now who's being sexist?
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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Not me. And I can't be wrong.
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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No, no - definitely not. I never argue with ladies for just that reason... 
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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So in what reason did you engage in an argument with ladies?
Don't mind those people who say you're not HOT. At least you know you're COOL.
I'm not afraid of falling, I'm afraid of the sudden stop at the end of the fall! - Richard Andrew x64
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