Inspired by Furkle’s talk at NarraScope 2019.

This outlines one way to get started in programming with less of the usual early problems. It’s opinionated. It’s a deliberately over-simplified view of things. There are loopholes in and caveats to most of the things I’m going to say; there are contexts where they’re just plain wrong, and possibly even dangerous. Take it with a grain of salt; YMMV; etc.

Once you get started you shouldn’t have too much trouble finding resources to go further. And there are about as many opinions on “good” programming as there are programmers, so you’ll have to find your own style. This is just to help you over the first hurdle of “what even is programming and how do I start?”

It uses JavaScript because reasons. But I strongly believe that all programming languages are similar, so I’m trying to explain things in a way that will serve you well regardless of what languages you go on to use.

So:

• Computer programming is learned primarily through “failure”. This does not mean you are bad at it. It’s impossible to avoid failure entirely. You should be asking, “how can I get the most out of each failure?”

• Running JavaScript code.

• Variables.

• Simple Data Types: numbers, text, true and false.

• Compound Data Types: lists and dictionaries.

• Control Flow Structures.

• Designing Programs.

• Choosing Names.