"Nearly all programming languages or instruction sets for assembly languages are also coincidental interfaces (this time for programming), often (though not always) at least originally designed by some "megacorp":"
Nearly all the mainstream, massively successful ones, yes. But the vast bulk of languages are not, and there is little evidence to be provided that there is some sort of massive advantage to be gained by "normal users" for any of them. There are better ones than those for some purposes, yes, but after many thousands of languages it's not like there's one that is clearly better for non-programmers, and this after at least several dozen and probably several hundred attempts explicitly aimed at that purpose.
Asking for people to understand the math is an even larger ask than asking them to understand the programming, which I base on the fact you can still find a very significant percentage of professional programmers, possibly even the majority, who have disdain for the mathematical elements of computing.
This is a not-very-generous reading of "most", because while I read that as "most programming languages (weighed by how often they are used)" you can also read that as "most programming languages (weighed by counting them)" if you want to prove some point.
In the context of discussing whether or not there is a more non-programmer friendly programming language, the fact that there are dozens or hundreds of attempts at that specific problem, which have largely failed, is relevant. The programming world is not defined by the top 10ish commercial languages; they're merely "very important".
It is also not an unfriendly reading when my very first words (which I have not edited) acknowledge the alternative readings.
I might just be confused, but I'm having a hard time understanding what point you're trying to make. I've read your comments and the context a couple times now and now I'm only sure that you're reading something in other comments that I'm simply not reading.
Yes, there are programming languages aimed at non-programmers. Many of these are also "commercial" languages, or at least were commercial in origin (like C). Smalltalk (Xerox), Hypertalk (Apple), the efforts towards 5GLs in the 1980s, Visual Basic (Microsoft), etc. We agree that these are relevant, I'm just not sure what point you're trying to make with that relevance, and I'd love it if you could elaborate.
>, I'm just not sure what point you're trying to make with that relevance,
I'll make an attempt to explain why jerf's response looks out of place.
Basically, wolfgke and jerf looked at the 2 groupings of programming languages (mainstream megacorps vs unknown) as evidence for 2 different goals.
wolfgke: generalization path -- dominance of megacorps languages means you must keep going one level lower in hierarchy of computer science concepts to learn universal concepts instead of proprietary syntax.
jerf: pedagogy ease of use -- megacorps languages are not provably any harder to learn than specialized toy languages
How did those two end up talking about 2 different things?!?
If you look at the comment chain from posters threatofrain-->bryanrasmussen-->wolfgke ... they started a dialogue that keeps diving lower and lower in underlying principles. It's a variation of the XKCD comic about "purity".[1]
jerf's response doesn't continue that purity dissection. Instead, his emphasis on pedagogy seems to point back to the original article by Jakob Nielsen which prompted this thread. That article says that elite users (like HN readers) can use complicated computer software and we forget that most others can't. The communication breakdown was assuming that wolfgke listed the megacorps language as a (ease-of-use) response to J Nielsen instead of a specific (purity) reply to bryanrasmussen.
But then again, I might have misunderstood everybody and I have no idea what people were trying to say.
> wolfgke: generalization path -- dominance of megacorps languages means you must keep going one level lower in hierarchy of computer science concepts to learn universal concepts instead of proprietary syntax.
Correct, with the additional (IMHO important) fact that threatofrain criticized "coincidental interfaces made by a few mega corporations" and looked for more general skills, bryanrasmussen meant that "knowing how to program" is such a skill, but I analyzed that most popular programming languages are also just "coincidental interfaces made by a few mega corporations" (this time for programming instead of the general user), so that we have nothing won concerning the original problem of "coincidental interfaces made by a few mega corporations" - we are just some layers deeper. So I suggested that if you look for more general skills, you probably have to look even deeper into the mathematical or the electrical engineering side of computing.
Nearly all the mainstream, massively successful ones, yes. But the vast bulk of languages are not, and there is little evidence to be provided that there is some sort of massive advantage to be gained by "normal users" for any of them. There are better ones than those for some purposes, yes, but after many thousands of languages it's not like there's one that is clearly better for non-programmers, and this after at least several dozen and probably several hundred attempts explicitly aimed at that purpose.
Asking for people to understand the math is an even larger ask than asking them to understand the programming, which I base on the fact you can still find a very significant percentage of professional programmers, possibly even the majority, who have disdain for the mathematical elements of computing.