[racket] Request for guidance

I have completed about half of the first edition of HtDP, and also have
read most of Realm of Racket, and Land of Lisp as well.

I have to say, the first half of HtDP dealing with data structures was the
ONLY thing that gave me the fundamental insights into programming that I
needed to understand it.  The rest gave me some instructions so I could
hack a few hacks, but nothing about how to THINK about programming.

If you feel comfortable with the solid knowledge you are getting from HtDP,
then I think Realm of Racket could be a fun way to dive into personal
programming.  I find that it is teaching the simple, clear ways we can
build interactive programs with Racket (perhaps 2E is doing the same), and
it is asking the reader to start hacking on their own.  Reading and
modifying the source code from the book is encouraged (and I believe rms
said something about to become a programmer you have to read and write lots
of programs), which is probably what a lot of "real" programming will
entail.  You might not understand it all, and Realm of Racket is going to
give you shortcuts to solve problems that HtDP is actually showing the guts
of.  But it will probably get you thinking about fun little games and
programs you could write yourself.  You'll probably run into problems you
didn't think about, and then maybe some more HtDP fundamentals will help
you understand things better.

Personally, I find I learn better when I have a few different perspectives
going on.  Between Land of Lisp, Realm of Racket, and HtDP, there's a whole
lot of valuable information for fun and enlightening programming times!

-grant


On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 9:03 AM, Saad Bashir <bashir.saad at gmail.com> wrote:

> I am a novice programmer - actually a novice learner - and this group and
> 2HTDP have been invaluable resources for me - really inspirational.
>
> Through this group I learned about the launch of Realm of Racket.  I also
> noted the advice by Matthias about the sequence to follow in learning (BSL.
> ISL, ASL, racket).
>
> I am in the first third of HTDP/2.
>
> What I want to know is should I start with Realm of Racket too?  I have
> obtained it and seems fun and has Matthias's  name - as a guarantor of
> quality - on it.  Or should I complete HTDP and if I do so, will not need
> to go through Realm of Racket at all?  Or should I do Realm of Racket first
> and then HTDP?
>
> Please give me an opinion.  I know Matthias follows posts and will be very
> grateful for his advice.
>
> Saad
>
>
>
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