But in the long run knowing all that makes it easier. We could have some GUI for doing all those things but it would end up being a massive mess of buttons EVERYWHERE and endless menus. And maybe a nice wizard could be designed for the given example that you could check the boxes as you go and it would be easy to figure out the first time. But after 5 years of doing this same thing do you want to spend 2 minutes clicking through a wizard every time or do you want to have spent a little time learning some cryptic commands a couple years back and now you can type it out in 20 seconds. Or better yet you made a script and it takes 1 second to run ./processAndInsertToDevDb
I think the point is that most programming tools aren’t made to be easy to use the first time. They’re made so that the 100th or 1000th time it’s fast even if every time it’s been a little different.
> But in the long run knowing all that makes it easier. We could have some GUI for doing all those things but it would end up being a massive mess of buttons EVERYWHERE and endless menus.
I didn't cite the commandline itself as the problem. PowerShell does a significantly better job at making sense than typical core-utils do, but you hear people used to core-utils bad mouth it all the time because it isn't exactly the same as core-utils.
And I submit that your lack of ability to conceptualize a GUI for doing the same thing does not mean one can't exist, but that is beside the point, because I don't think knowing how to use those tools is a necessary and fundamental part of programming anyway.
Someone who is just getting started in a new programming environment shouldn't need to know the ins and outs of a dozen different tools, especially when those tools are used to solve problems that user has not even conceptualized the existence of yet.
Again, this all comes down to one thing: why is it so damned complicated just to get enough of a programming environment running that the user can write a goddamned program? Not write it well, not write it efficiently, just f'ing write it in the first place?
> And I submit that your lack of ability to conceptualize a GUI for doing the same thing does not mean one can't exist, but that is beside the point
If you have the time I would challenge you to spend an hour or two mocking up what you think a GUI with the same capabilities as powershell or bash would look like. I would genuinely be curious what you come up with. Personally I do not think it would be possible to do in an intuitive way.
> Someone who is just getting started in a new programming environment shouldn't need to know the ins and outs of a dozen different tools, especially when those tools are used to solve problems that user has not even conceptualized the existence of yet.
For some more complicated environments yeah it is hard to get the environment up and running. Python environment hell is a very really thing. But if you want a a simple environment to write a simple program is it trivially easy to get one up and running.
I am on computer I’ve never downloaded python on. I just googled python IDE. Clicked on the top result, pycharm. Downloaded latest release clicked next 4-5 times without looking at options. Opened it. Agreed to some TOS. Clicked new project and then clicked next without looking at any settings. Then I clicked the big green run icon. It printed “Hi, PyCharm”.
Python is a beginner friendly language and if I wanted to start programming it is probably the recommendation I would get. I did not have to know anything to install it and start programming.
And even easier if I want to do front end development I just go to codepen.com and that’s all I need to do!
I think the point is that most programming tools aren’t made to be easy to use the first time. They’re made so that the 100th or 1000th time it’s fast even if every time it’s been a little different.