this is the problem right here!! I never said any choice was best!

I made a freaking suggestion. Read what I posted a second ago:




Along the way to becoming a proficient programmer, all of the stuff in this thread discussed and much much more you would figure out on your own. If someone said don't do X or you MUST do Z, it doesn't matter. If he made his choice based on a programming forum on JSP then he was doomed to begin with.

I come here to get perspectives, but I would never make a cold decision based off this stuff.

I come here to be entertained. And for that, I have you to thank.

This is the content of rocks first post in the thread.

He:

1) Craps all over someone else (who successfully helped the person by that point)

and

2) Echoes something which was obviously already seen

case in point:



Did he really need to post here at all? No. Did I really need to post in response to him? No.

still not seeing how the fault is one sided.

Not really. Pointing out your background (or its lack thereof) is fairly relevant here for the advice that was being asked for and given.

Is what he said not a fact? Be honest here. It's not really an insult if it's true.

Also, you didn't successfully help the person by any standards. In fact, I'd say it was worse than that -- you gave him bad and misleading advice, which is worse than not posting at all.



He felt the need to point out the above, which is fairly legitimate. Did you really need to post in response? Of course not. But you did.


Your move.

This post was edited by irimi on Oct 18 2012 06:31pm

Of course he found it "extremely helpful" he's clueless (as everyone who is just starting is) and he got advice from someone who appears to have experience. You could have told him to learn mindfuck and assembly and he would have liked your advice. It's doesn't mean that the advice given was good.

Let's also be entirely clear as to when the so-called "hostility" (aka flaming) begins. It begins right here:




That's right. kenshin's post is not where it starts, because all he did was point out a simple matter of fact (that you can barely program, and that value of the advice you gave was entirely questionable). The only value judgement he made in his post was with respect to the advice given, and not the people giving them.

What you wrote here, on the other hand, implies that kenshin doesn't have the ability to do "hard thinking". That is, in fact, a value judgement and an insult on the person and not on what was said -- and without any justification whatsoever.

Or, to be even more clear, let me direct you to a useful wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

Edit: In before "that's not what I meant, you only chose to read it that way."

This post was edited by irimi on Oct 18 2012 06:43pm

it is your opinion that all he did was point out a simple matter of fact.



like I said before, I offered no concrete advice other than to look at university online courses and that there is a lot more to programming than just a language.

I said c++/java contain cool stuff.

You said he is clueless. He read the thread, found what he needed, and left. If I single handedly ruined his future career as a programmer from my two posts, then like I said, I don't think there was much hope to begin with.

When I first came here, people offered similar (or worse) advice (such as not going to college at all), and I ended up finding the right path anyway.

You guys just can't bring yourselves to admit that I helped someone. I don't see how I was being misleading about anything I said.

edit: you make it sound like that because of my posts, him and anyone else I help will be screwed for the rest of their lives. That is a silly notion.

This post was edited by Eep on Oct 18 2012 06:47pm

The amount to which you can take almost everything personally continues to amaze and astound me.

Someone posts a thread offering some fairly solid/useful advice for people who want to become better programmers ---> you take it as an affront to the way you learn.
Someone calls out your "advice" for being terrible ---> you take it as an attempt to undermine your efforts in helping someone (or at least, to undermine the recognition of you helping someone).
Someone says you can barely program ---> you think this is about you.

Hey, that sounds familiar. You think this is about you. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: it isn't about you. It never was.


Nobody's said anything about them being screwed for the rest of their lives. That's more stuff that's just all in your head.

This post was edited by irimi on Oct 18 2012 06:50pm

No one said you were trying to mislead this guy. You really believe what you said was good advice. We are pointing out that your advice is questionable because you simply don't have the experience and knowledge to make a well-formed opinion on the matter. You seem to think you know way more than you actually do and anyone posting anything contrary to what you understand as fact is met with hilarity.

And he nails it. My pointing out that you can barely program isn't a slight against your character. It's a fact: You can barely program. I'm not saying you are dumb. I'm simply saying you aren't a good programmer yet. The only way to be one is to program more.

Since you aren't a good programmer recommending a starting language with authority is a silly thing to do. You just don't have the capacity to give a good answer. Regurgitating someone else's opinion without being able to explain why is worse. We aren't saying you screwed this guy. You may have just made his journey to become a programmer a little bit harder with your bad advice. Hell he probably won't even have the motivation to start anyway. We give suggestions like Python because we were at the point he was at in the past and we know through experience, trial and error what works and what doesn't.

edit: Accidental double post.

This post was edited by rockonkenshin on Oct 18 2012 06:53pm