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A comment on React.js koans.

Re:React.js koans by lowboy on Monday June 29, 2015 @12:28PM (#9799103)
I was expecting something very different from the word "koans". IMO, "React.js exercises" would be a better title for the project.
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Re:React.js koans by corysama on Monday June 29, 2015 @02:44PM (#9800044)
I believe the word they were looking for is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kata

Hmmm.... googling around, there seems to be a lot of recent "programming koans" that are actually collections of rote exercises rather than lessons in zen enlightenment. Frustrating...

It looks like what happened was that a while back, someone made a very nice set of exercises each presented as a koan and a failing unit test to "meditate upon". Imitators then watered that down to exercises presented as failing unit tests to "meditate upon". Which was later watered down to just exercises...

For a classic example of an actual programming koan, I can only refer to the archive of Doug Bagely's "Functional Programming Koans, in OCaml" http://web.archive.org/web/20041012103936/http://www.bagley.... and, the old favorite teaching the relationship between objects and closures http://people.csail.mit.edu/gregs/ll1-discuss-archive-html/m...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:React.js koans by andybak on Monday June 29, 2015 @03:09PM (#9800209)
If this is the case, we should appeal to the author's sense of decency.

The concept of 'koan' is far too unique and beautiful to be watered down.

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Re:React.js koans by Roodgorf on Monday June 29, 2015 @05:10PM (#9801107)
I think you're right in the confusion of koan and kata, but unfortunately yes, I have seen a lot of that happening lately (perhaps due to greater awareness of the word from recent popularity of CodeWars[0]?). Interestingly I've only seen this mistake in this direction, I have not seen any koans mislabeled as kata.

[0] http://www.codewars.com/about

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Re:React.js koans by jt2190 on Monday June 29, 2015 @05:36PM (#9801294) 

  > Which was later watered down to just exercises...
What if the word "koan" were understood to mean "excercise"?
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Re:React.js koans by corysama on Monday June 29, 2015 @07:30PM (#9801869)
That's the problem. Someone made a nice set of "programming koans" that were (koans + exercises). But, that has spawned new "programming koans" that are just a set of (exercises) with no koans. Koans are supposed to involve practice [0]. But, does practicing a set of (koans + exercises - koans) have koan-nature? ;)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C5%8Dan

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Re:React.js koans by mmanfrin on Monday June 29, 2015 @02:20PM (#9799888)
A nod to ruby koans (which was probably a nod to another language): https://github.com/neo/ruby_koans
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Re:React.js koans by Lazare on Monday June 29, 2015 @05:19PM (#9801179)
Same.

Although apparently the word is misused a lot: http://www.lauradhamilton.com/learn-a-new-programming-langua...

Not sure if this is a fight we can still win.

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Re:React.js koans by mattdotc on Tuesday June 30, 2015 @01:00AM (#9803040)
Outsider's perspective looking in: This is hacker versus cracker all over again.
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Re:React.js koans by Retra on Tuesday June 30, 2015 @01:48AM (#9803165)
People are probably awful... They hear a new word, don't know what it means, and then copy it all over the place until it doesn't mean anything anymore.
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Re:React.js koans by sup on Monday June 29, 2015 @02:13PM (#9799841)
"exercises" is not hip enough.
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