Discussion

LowRes NX Learning Curve

nathanielbabiak 2022-06-09 20:13

I've started two or three tutorials on various subjects. But, I want to make sure I'm hitting the important stuff.

In your opinion, what was (or remains) the hardest thing about programming for this console that you wish you could figure out?

nathanielbabiak 2022-06-10 01:16

I'm also going through the forum posts and the (current?) fantasy console discord looking for frequently asked questions, like a retrospective study.

nathanielbabiak 2022-06-10 03:15 (Edited)

The retrospective study was... illuminating. I've reviewed approx. 70% of the forum posts. There's three categories of questions:

Beginners and non-native English speakers are trying to learn Basic via LRNX. They don't know how to ask a question with jargon/terminology, but have a rough idea of what they're trying to accomplish.
The display system is complex.
Specific questions on individual subjects that either: the manual glosses over, or the manual addresses, but requires 100% English fluency to do so.

This leads me to two conclusions:

Edit: Just realized the stuff below is what the tutorials should focus on...

We should create a second version of the manual prioritizing often discussed topics in Basic English, keeping all the content in the same order, but rewriting each sentence to be maybe 3-4 explicit sentences. These would be translatable, accessible to younger or inexperienced users, and would just be plain easier to understand since the information would be more sparse amongst the words.

Many users want to learn Basic on this console.

There's a few fundamental (non-LRNX) concepts that kept coming up, that should be written up:

what are syntax characters, instructions, arguments
how subprograms work, including reference arguments
how RAM/registers work, including ROM loading at startup (and how tools save files, but the Basic English would address it)
how to structure the major activities of an immediate program (not an event-driven program)
how to debug an error code (maybe how to trace code too, but that's a bit more nuanced)

nathanielbabiak 2022-06-10 03:23 (Edited)

I guess I'm going to think about this stuff a bit more, and see what I can come up with...

Edits above. Just realized the stuff I saw as being frequent questions... is the FAQ... is the stuff tutorials should focus on. (It just really surprised me the topics weren't what I thought they'd be!)

was8bit 2022-06-10 04:05 (Edited)

I reckon NX was designed with the idea that users have a familiarity with older systems... machine language, basic language... and some familiarity of gaming hardware...

Programming lowres NX similates the experience of writing code for a real hand-held gaming system...

So, i reckon those completely new to programming in general might benefit from learning the history and intention behind these things ...

Timo 2022-06-10 16:38

I mixed up the target audience of NX a bit. I wanted to make it authentic, because it seemed more interesting to me and to make a difference to the other fantasy consoles. But I still wrote in the description, that it's easy to learn. I think that's right for very basic things, but later it gets much more complex than other FCs.

I don't think anymore, that NX is a good choice for young people to learn programming. I mean I'm very happy that some started programming with NX (or LowRes Coder), but why should young people learn how classic game consoles worked?

So, thinking about better documentation or tutorials, I think the target should be people who are interested in classic consoles with some technical background.

nathanielbabiak 2022-07-14 04:32 (Edited)

Honestly it seems (?sadly?) realistic to learn about restrictions/complications that are totally unnecessary in other competitor's software development environments... that's pretty much what those young people would be practicing if they got a job in IT, right? (Just kidding!)

I agree with you both about the focus of the tutorials. Update's here.