But that's teaching a new generation of coders a set of tools designed only for Apple. Ruby (Python etc) are open and easily available on other platforms, Swift may be in the future but it isn't now.

Swift is open and available on other platforms. I can install it on a raspberry pi if I want.

https://swiftreviewer.com/2018/12/21/swift-programming-on-ra...

Once you’ve learned one programming language, it’s not hard to learn a second. It’s not terribly important what you’re first language is, and Swift isn’t a bad starting point anyway.

Huh? You can download Ubuntu builds right on their site

https://swift.org/download/

Funny. I learned on qbasic and I remember they were teaching dr racket at ubc to first year students. They were teaching java when I was in engineering and my career has basically gotten zero Mileage from that stinking heap of uncollected garbage.

How about using a web browser with JavaScript?

Maybe not the best language for someone new but its widely available.

How about just a web browser?

You can run almost any language from a web browser these days:

https://repl.it/languages/

A lot of educational sites offer embedded interpreters like this.

It has never been easier to start to learn programming. The real challenge nowadays is maintaining attention...