Introductory Programmming for Non-Programmers (Score 1)

**Many of the people who take introductory programming classes are not going to be programmers.*** The world is now full of engineers, economists, statisticians, linguists, etc. that have programming responsibilities in addition to all the other things they have to do. They need a language for quick solutions and that's what an introductory programming language should teach them how to get quick high-level decisions. Only the people who are going to be computer science majors and write C++ code should worry about shifting around bits and bytes, and three's complement...etc. The programming language taught in introductory programming language classes should allow the student to accomplish a lot, solve difficult problems, create sopphisticated gui interfaces without writing a lot of code. Python with Tkinter, the numerical libraries, the very clear OO programming style, is the best for this IMHO. Extensions in let's say C++/STL also seem easier to make with Perl. It's also less Unix-centric. Python seems to be inheriting the best from Perl while eliminating it's obfuscations. Jon Fernquest [e-mail] [e-mail]