Teaching Programming

Teaching programming

One of the things I want to do is teach. My plan is, now that I (F'''ucking FINALLY!) finished my engineering degree, is to work a few years in the robotics industry, and then spend half my worktime there, and half teaching kids programming and code. Because,

A:

I feel that in the same way that you need to know physics, reading, internet literacy, history and a bunch of other skills to navigate the modern world, you also need programming. Not that everyone should become a software engineer. But everyone should be able to set up a few scripts to automate things on their PC, and know enough about how code works to know how the software that runs the world works. In the same way that you know enough about physics to know how satellites giving you internet works. Could you build that? No, of course not. Nor should you. But you know things can go in orbit. That things can communicate wirelessly over long distances and so on. You know enough about mechanics to use a screwdriver to take simple things apart and clean them, and know that you do NOT know enough to fix the electronics in your dishwasher.

You know it is not magic. Yet... programming is often thought of as that. And it really should not be. I swear to you. It is easy. Not to develop code to run a car, but to have it automatically edit text in a file according to rules you made? You betcha. B:

While learning to program as a job takes years, learning enough to understand the basics, and being able and unafraid to set up a script or throw together a python program to automatically sort files on your work computer really does not take a lot of time or effort. And I will guarantee, most students will benefit a lot from it. C:

Programming is much more a craft, like mechanic or carpenter. But more appealing for kids who are not confident in working with their hands. There is also good reasons for why it used to be thought of as a thing people who did not get along with others did. It is, in essence, defining and solving puzzles. To solve problems, that you also have to define yourself. Many a child have found that programming was a thing they could do, and be good at. A thing that helped them be confident. Maker spaces and learning programs with robotics or game development is filled with youngsters eager to learn. Who have finally find a thing they can be good at! But these programs a rare. And often schools and teachers mismanage how to run them. Not out of malice (There are few professions that is filled with more kindhearted people that deserves our endless appreciation than teachers), but because there are endless well paid and prestigious career opportunities for software developers. And so most schools will not have anyone who can even advice them when they set up these things. There is so much good to do. And I want to do some of it!

Sometimes you just accept a flaw and move along

So I am building a robot from scratch. It just needs to be a platform for my other projects. It takes Twist commands (Basically, orders how fast to move in what directions) and return odometry (Basically, where the robot thinks it is), both over wifi via the HTTP protocol. Because the odometry math is a lot easier with stepper motors(motors that moves in tiny discreet steps. Usually several hundreds for a single rotation), these are what I am using: I am using 2 TMC2100 boards to drive them. These have 2 pins that you can set to Ground, supply or let them float, and they are used to configure what amount of micro-stepping you want to do (If a stepper motor have 200 steps for a rotation, micro stepping 4 means it takes 4 smaller steps to do one of those 200 "real" steps, and so takes 800 steps for a full rotation) All great... eeeeexept... for some reason the configuration pins just does... nothing, no matter what I set them to. The boards are just stuck at 16 micro-steps, as if both pins where set to supply. This limits the robots speed to 0.3 meters per second... which is... fine. The amount of work and money it would take to fix this(Likely I would have to buy new boards) is not worth a speed boost that is not needed for the first 2-3 projects I want to test on top of it... so I am just leaving it. "Perfect is the enemy of good" and all that... but it still feels unsatisfying... blaaa

Have you seen a girl boy

I saw a... WONDERFULL poem that really hit me, but I needed to fix it a bit first, before I send it to my boys .Original from here:

"If it looks stupid but it works, it ain't stupid" Me: "Hold my beer"

GREAT job!!! It is... SO shit that how companies hire people is so very toxic. From all aspects. It SUCKS for the one applying, like you. But frankly, also it is bad for the companies. When I hear someone going "I did not quite know how to do a thing, and did not want to. But I knew it was important and the best way to learn is to just do it. So I did. I then learned from that experience, and have already optimized a bit, and will do more, for next time we do this", and my IMMEDIATE thought is "I want to work with that person. Hire them" Because yes, getting someone with experience in the technologies that a company uses is a nice perk. But the MAIN thing you want from a developer is how good they WILL become, and how quickly they can become good. Every job requires different tech, and even within that job, the tech will change. So it is much more valuable to get someone who can (and will) learn the new technology and how they best work it. And yet, people who have these good qualities, like you, are hidden or even sorted away via these idiotic systems so many companies use to hire people

Just did my first internship interview. I was completely undeprepared. It was rought, I stuttered and gave very vague and repetitive answers when I didn't know how to answer a question. Didn't have a cv to show the recruiter. It was a mess!! But at least i now have experience, and a renewed want to study and prepare myself better. AND MAKE A LINKEDIN. Oh god, make a linkedin. I absolutely started crying out of nervousness the second the call ended, but Im better now. I think. I hope so.