Today I stumbled upon the first program I ever wrote. It’s an interesting story looking back twenty years later.
When I was somewhere between 8-10 years old my uncle gave my family our first computer, a Coleco Adam. Along with the computer we were given the now classic book BASIC Computer Games. No one in my family new anything about compilers, programming, or computers in general, but we were excited about the idea of creating something out of nothing so decided to give one of these programs a go.
We decided on Bunny and began to slowly peck out the source code into the text editor. We saved the file, exited the editor, and then stared blankly at the screen as we realized we didn’t know what to do next. Interpreters and compilers were obviously never discussed and after our futile attempts of running our program failed, I decided to take a different approach.
What was I trying to accomplish? What were the outcomes I needed? The answer was simple- an ASCII image of a bunny. So that’s what I created, and ASCII image of a bunny. For the rest of the afternoon I typed out the bunny by hand and by using brute force I eventually accomplished the goal.
This retrospective reminds me that when things “just aren’t working”, sometimes I need to take a step back and reevaluate my methods. I may have an Occam’s razor type revelation that could satisfy requirements without significant compromises.
Keep it old school and tell the world your first programming experience in a comment below.
6 Comments
My first programming experience was some time in elementary school when I took a summer class taught by a family friend… on and Apple II. Likely it was a hello world, but I definitely remember creating a maze that would get displayed on the screen. A few years later I learned how to program Hypercard and made a little music tutor app with full keyboard (+ sound!), tutorials, and quizes. Gosh, I must have been bored!
@Cameron: Hah I remember using Hypercard too. I think I made a solar system in it back in the day.
I remember doing a very similar thing – making my dad help me type out the binary code (like 8 pages worth!!) to make our dot matrix printer spit out a likeness of alfred e. newman.
ah man.. the entry takes me back! I was typing in code from my C=64 Mags that I paid through the nose because they were from europe.
My first programming experience was some time in elementary school when I took a summer class taught by a family friend… on and Apple II. Likely it was a hello world, but I definitely remember creating a maze that would get displayed on the screen. A few years later I learned how to program Hypercard and made a little music tutor app with full keyboard (+ sound!), tutorials, and quizes. Gosh, I must have been bored!
Like Bradly, the first computer program I wrote was from the classic programming book edited by David H. Ahl on an HP 1000. The first program I typed in was “Hunt the Wumpus” and then Super StarTrek. Call me a little nostalgic but I tracked down David H. Ahl to thank him for inspiring me to become a computer programmer when I was a kid. Then I did something really crazy. I asked David if I could have his permission to republish his classic programming book in a modern computer programming language so a whole new generation of kids could also be inspired by his classic book. He said yes and David also wrote an updated 2010 introduction to the new book. George Beker, who illustrated several of the original books, also came out of retirement and added a few more Robot illustrations to a new Special Illustrated edition of the new book. You can now relive all those classic games like Super Star Trek, MUGWUP and Lunar LEM Rocket. The 2010 Small Basic Edition includes almost all the classic BASIC games that inspired a generation of programmers but now in Microsoft Small Basic for a new generation of kids. It was published as an E-Book so you can easily cut and paste the Small Basic Source Code right into your Small Basic Compiler. You can find out more about this new Microsoft Small Basic Edition at http://computerscienceforkids.com/SmallBasicComputerGames.aspx. You can also find out more about Microsoft’s new Small Basic Development environment for Kids at http://www.smallbasic.com.