Re: Re: Book Ranking

OTOH, though, there is a problem with this: after doing something long enough, a person loses his qualifications to judge the value of an introductory-level work. Sure, we can talk about whether the jokes in the third llama are better than the ones in the second, but the "proof of the pudding" for a text on that level is whether someone who doesn't know what they're doing can pick it up and learn how. As a degenerate example, try picking up Dr. Seuss' "Hop on Pop" and evaluate its ability to teach you simple prepositions; you can certainly see where they're used in the text, but you no longer have a frame of reference to gauge its effectiveness.

That said, I DO believe that a weighted rating system has potential, provided there is some categorization of intended audience. For example, consider (with a weight sliding-scale of 0-1.0):

Advanced/Internals - example: panther - weighted at 1.0 for poster level 9, -0.1/level below
Specialized Topics - example: Stein's NPP - weighted at 1.0 for poster level 6, -0.2/level below
Intermediate - example: shiny ball - weighted at 1.0 for poster level 5, -0.2/level below, -0.1/level above
Introductory - example: llama - weighted at 1.0 for poster level 3, -0.2/level above to a minimum of 0.1
Reference - example: camel - weighted at 1.0 for poster level 3, -0.4/level below

This way, some estimation of the poster being in the target audience for the book is factored into the weighting system as well.

Spud Zeppelin * spud@spudzeppelin.com

Comment on Re: Re: Book Ranking

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Re (tilly) 3: Book Ranking by tilly (Archbishop) on Sep 08, 2001 at 20:41 UTC
While there is some truth that advanced people may have a hard time appreciating the position of not advanced people, it is equally true that people who are not advanced are not in a good position to evaluate how many misconceptions they were taught, or to know how many bad habits they will later have to unlearn. As a result while I wouldn't say that being advanced makes you qualified to decide how good a book is for beginners, it does not disqualify you either. And if beginners are taken as the only judge of what beginners need, it becomes a case of the blind leading the blind. Consider well the example of Matt Wright's Script Archives if you don't get my point...	[reply]
Re: Re (tilly) 3: Book Ranking by spudzeppelin (Pilgrim) on Sep 10, 2001 at 19:16 UTC
Consider well the example of Matt Wright's Script Archives if you don't get my point... Actually, I think you just reinforced mine! Think about it: we all know how bad Matt's code, when treated as complete works, actually is. But, there is a lot someone who is an absolute beginner can learn from looking at functional (however lousy) code - syntax, in particular. Again, it's the Hop on Pop problem; nobody would call Hop on Pop one of the great works of Western literature, and nobody would call Matt's form-mailer a great example of perl, but that doesn't mean you can't learn a lot about how the language is put together from them. Think of it another way: if you knew nothing about C++, wouldn't having the source to ANY program at all, even hello.cpp, help you learn the idiosyncracies of the language ("cout()" for example)? Yes, there is the potential for the "blind leading the blind," but OTOH the ultimate judgement on a beginning-level book needs to be a beginner saying "I was able to learn perl from this" or "I was unable to learn perl from this" -- and that is a judgement that we cannot, by definition, make. Spud Zeppelin * spud@spudzeppelin.com	[reply]
Re: Re: Re: Book Ranking by Hanamaki (Chaplain) on Sep 08, 2001 at 21:26 UTC
After doing something long enough, a person loses his qualifications to judge the value of an introductory-level work. True for some, but not all of us. For some years I taught my native language to foreigners and had to make decisions on the approbriate textbook. I don't think first year students are more qualified than me, to judge which language textbook is better for them. Of course its no easy job to judge a textbook and I have spent a lot of (mostly unpaid) time in reviewing beginners textbooks. That does not mean, that I am not interested in reviews and opinions by beginners; they are helpful as well. And they helped me to do my job better. While these kind of information is helpful and interesting a book review is much more than "it worked for me" or "it doesn't work for me" . Believe me or not, but reviewing a book (in a fair way) is pretty hard work. I believe that many of the more advanced Perl Monks are able to review a book like the Llama Book in a fair way, but this won't be done in just a few minutes or an hour, but will take many hours or days. Hanamaki	[reply]