Friday, May 16, 2008

The power of "Hello world"

“Hello world”
We all software professionals know this phrase very well…. rite!!!!
Start learning any language (if not all then most of them…) the first practical example would be a “hello world” program. I always use to think why these all writers’ starts with this phrase only and not any other phrase. Might be the one who wrote first most famous article or book on some language would have used this as first example and then all other writers just followed, But then again question arises what made any or all of them to choose this phrase only!!!!
Well, for most of us it really does not matter… but don’t u think it will be fun to understand that what actually drove them to use it.
As far as I see it I find that it’s because of the power of this phrase …… this phrase can be seen as a declaration or a pledge from our end, as learner of any new language, that we will implement the knowledge for the betterment of this world. We are only introducing ourselves to the world with this first program And is setting an expectation that world can expect much more fruitful implementation of our knowledge in future.
But, do we really keeping up our promise??? We better know the answer….

Without digging the issue , I would like to keep it simple….What you guys feel about authors using “hello world ” example as first step towards teaching the languages? Think something wizard ;)