Where Will We Be In 10 Years’ Time?

Author - Steve Del Nevo

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Where Will We Be In 10 Years’ Time?

I first got interested in computers when I was very young, I was given a ZX80 for a birthday present by a friend who had recently upgraded their computer to a ZX81 the year was 1982 an I was hooked.

As I had no games or any other software for it I had no option but to make my own and as such I spent all my pocket-money buying books that listed the code that would create a new game. This normally meant spending hours typing in the code only to find that it didn't work!! this was a great way to learn, as it meant I learnt through trial and error I was also lucky in that two of my friends eventually got one so we would discuss programming at school or whenever we could.

My school had just started a computer club where we would not only play games (on the Vic 20) but also learn Basic, throughout my childhood I had just about every 8Bit PC you could get but the one I found the best ( at least the easiest to program ) was the BBC model B.

It was great and had a brilliant keyboard to type on, the syntax of their version of Basic was stunning.

When 16Bit PC's became the Norm, being able to turn the computer on and program started to get harder, you had to install a programming language, I found Atari's environment very unintuitive to use, and as such I started to lose interest in programming also (discovering women) didn't help either I suppose!

Everything changed for me in 1994 when the Internet first became accessible, and I fell in love with HTML, I read everything I could about it, this involved into Java and Java script and of course PHP, Perl and Python, the thought of being able to program a web page that was dynamic, showing the visitor information based on the content of a databases provided massive potential, so this then brought the need for learning database table structures and query languages.

It amazes me how many kids today use computers but have no understanding of how they work, my son for example takes IT at school, but he is not taught how to resolve software or technical issues but instead is only instructed on using software applications (based toward Microsoft Technology).

There are some great languages to get your children interested in programming a great one is Simple, and is based very roughly on AppleSoft, the Basic language found on Apple-II computers, and is aimed at younger children with no prior knowledge of programming, and another great one is Microsoft Visual Basic Express

This leads me to think, where will we be in the next 10 years? Languages will evolve and technology advances will be massive how is the next generation of programmers / technical support guys supposed to cut their teeth?

Perhaps things will get to a point where the syntax of languages evolves to such a point that you will code programs and web pages by describing them in perfect English.

Where will we be in 10 year’s time? I'm not sure where the futures heading but who knows HTML 5 looks great but HTML 12 may well be the holy grail of programming for the Web, but I doubt it.

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