3.5 KiB
In the file
- first draft of this little writing
Preamble Note
Before I go into any detail at all I should mention that in fact this whole post is somewhat of a rant on a pet peeve of mine. At the same time I want to discuss why this mostly exists as a problem I have with the """absolute state""" of computer science education.
I'm in the file what now?
I've lost track of how many times this has been thrown my by students learning about the commandline in a *nix environment. It's not that I loathe this phrasing but, I completely loathe it. Something about it feels as though many don't realize that they're not actually saying anything with this phrase. It's like going to change your oil and saying, "alright im in the engine".
For those trying to learn "the commandline/terminal" I have on piece of advice: a directory is a folder. To be honest I know this stems from students being taught """the commandline""" with literally 0 context given. I use a terminal for everything, hell this whole website was built in the termianl but, even I don't know what people mean when they say, "I know the commandline". All I know is that they refer to Linux stuff but even then I'm not completely sure what that is supposed to mean.
The part where I blame academia
How many times has academia managed to fist its way into every crevice of the world with no complaints I'll never know, but I do know it sucks for everyone. I say this because for learning theory academia has always been great, structuring that which needed it most. For everything outside of that realm, eh.
It seems like at least in CSU Monterey Bay the staff have a hard-on for Unix but have little idea of how to teach it.
Another section for my prosed solution so its easy find
Stop directly teaching how to use the commandline. Instead setup students in a situation where commandline utilities would be the easiest to setup or the best choice to use.
B-b-but if we do that they might not do it pro-
Stop, they're going to fuck things up regardless, at least this way they'll learn the dumb meme you're targeting but in a practical manner. Trust me whatever they end up learning, they will not forget. Details sure; everyone forgets details, but at least most students(apart from the stupid ones) will know at least some basic tricks to help them later in (CS) life.
Pet Peeve
Nearly everytime I help another student with command line stuff I hold back cringe upon hearing the phrase, "I'm in the file what do i do now????". If anyone can decipher the meaning of this phrase I would love to know but as of right now I'm stumped. It reminds of when a mechanic friend of mine told me of how he can't stand hering customers say, "yea the engine is on the fritz".
Filesystems are vry hrd
Recently at my university more and more of the curriculum has been focused on teaching student of the Unix command line environment. This entails a few things:
- Teach students some basic utility in case they find themselves needing to do some remote work
- Exposure to new tools(more on this point in another section)
Though the prospect may be enticing its the execution which ruins the whole thing. Primarily the problem with teaching unix to students is the lack of context. Tools like Git, Bash, or even an editor like Nano end up being confusing to students for some new arbitrary reason. When I say that these things are confusing I mean I've literally had a student ask me, "What's the point of Git even? I don't get why we're learning this".