observation on ch 4
Ben Collins-Sussman
sussman at red-bean.com
Sat Aug 6 18:21:02 CDT 2005
On Aug 5, 2005, at 1:24 PM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
>
> just a personal opinion but i think it would have made more sense to
> have the section "The Key Concept Behind Merging" earlier before
> getting into specific examples.
>
> the idea that a merge operation incorporates three pieces of
> information would seem to be pretty important and it would be a handy
> reference for every example to come after that.
I think I disagree here. Merging is first introduced with a single
example, which jibes with the tutorial-esque nature of the chapter.
That section is immediately followed by a top-down overview ("The key
concept behind merging"). All the other examples/discussions of
merging then come afterwards.
As usual, it's hard to find a delicate balance between those people
who learn 'top down' (by reading the theory first) versus those who
learn 'bottom up' (by reading examples first.) I think that if we
started the merging section with pure theory, it would be very
unfriendly to the bottom-up learners. I think the current ordering
strikes a good balance: the top-down theory comes fairly early in
the section, but only after an initial example.
Am I making sense?
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