Microsoft To Kids With Chromebooks: No 2019 Minecraft Hour of Code For You! (zendesk.com) 72
Long-time Slashdot reader theodp writes:
In years past, Microsoft's wildly popular Minecraft-themed Hour of Code tutorials were browser-based, pretty much allowing schoolchildren to participate regardless of whether their schools used PCs, Macs or Chromebooks. "Computer science is a foundation for every student," Microsoft explained on a web page about the Hour of Code, adding that "a quality computer science education should be available to every child, not just a lucky few."
But that was then, and this is now.
"The new Minecraft Hour of Code tutorial," explains a new announcement at Microsoft-sponsored Code.org, "is now available in Minecraft: Education Edition for Windows, Mac, and iPad." So, when will the Chromebook version be available? Silly Rabbit, the 2019 Minecraft Hour of Code is for Windows and Apple kids! From the Minecraft 2019 Hour of Code Lesson FAQ:
Q. Does the Hour of Code Lesson work on Chromebooks?
A. The Hour of Code Lesson is not compatible with Chromebooks. If your class has Chromebooks and would like to do a Minecraft Hour of Code lesson, we recommend using one of the [old] Minecraft tutorials on Code.org."
Yes, but that means schoolkids with Chromebooks won't be exposed to the teased AI for Good concepts introduced in the 2019 Minecraft tutorial, which seems at odds with Microsoft's professed focus on democratizing AI and putting AI developer tools in the hands of "every public sector organization around the world."
But that was then, and this is now.
"The new Minecraft Hour of Code tutorial," explains a new announcement at Microsoft-sponsored Code.org, "is now available in Minecraft: Education Edition for Windows, Mac, and iPad." So, when will the Chromebook version be available? Silly Rabbit, the 2019 Minecraft Hour of Code is for Windows and Apple kids! From the Minecraft 2019 Hour of Code Lesson FAQ:
Q. Does the Hour of Code Lesson work on Chromebooks?
A. The Hour of Code Lesson is not compatible with Chromebooks. If your class has Chromebooks and would like to do a Minecraft Hour of Code lesson, we recommend using one of the [old] Minecraft tutorials on Code.org."
Yes, but that means schoolkids with Chromebooks won't be exposed to the teased AI for Good concepts introduced in the 2019 Minecraft tutorial, which seems at odds with Microsoft's professed focus on democratizing AI and putting AI developer tools in the hands of "every public sector organization around the world."
Microsoft has changed (Score:2, Interesting)
Evil vs evil (Score:4, Insightful)
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But Google itself provides a way out. It's called, uh, "Google". You just type in "minecraft code tutorial" and there you go.
Oh, Microsoft does as well. It's called "Bing" for some reason.
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MS : Do it our way or not at all (Score:5, Insightful)
Wanna Code? Then get rid of those Chromebooks... We have some lovely Surface 3's going cheap...
MS has not changed. If anything they are intent on building a really big wall around their stuff in order to make it next to impossible to escape. And charging you and arm and a leg while keeping you inside their walled garden.
Meet the new MS... Same as the old MS
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The appeal to popularity is a logical fallacy, not a mic drop moment... especially since Windows' dominance was secured by illegal means.
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Windows dominance on the desktop only, else where, it has become pretty much a fail. It is just annoying for us remaining few who use a desktop, that will still have to put up with the abusive arrogance of M$. Clearly though the deck is stacked against M$ in the future, they dominate a shrinking market, the desktop and now that is starting to come under further and further under pressure. That they provided access originally and then dropped it, shows real panic mode thinking, trying every silly thing to st
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LoB
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word had it that Microsoft stole their Windows OS design from Apple when Apple hired them to make a Mac version of MS Word.
Representatives of both Apple and Microsoft got to see GUIs at Xerox before either of them had one. Apple went off and did their own thing, while Microsoft patterned Windows more closely after IBM's Common User Access [wikipedia.org] standard. Microsoft and IBM were also both on the original Motif WG, so CUA and Motif were broadly similar. And in fact, Windows and Motif turned out the most similarly; Windows 3.1 looks and acts just like Motif with less 3d-look; Windows 95 looks more like OS/2 but still acts just like Motif
Re: MS : Do it our way or not at all (Score:5, Informative)
Tiny and unpopular? Context matters, and in this context you can't be talking about chrome because it's currently the dominant OS in education. Not by a little but by a lot. Apple and Microsoft are both tiny players in that space these days at 22% and 18%, respectively, vs Google's 60%.
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An OS that now has over 50% market share in an important market, K-12 education in the US? Not so tiny or unpopular. Windows has been gaining some market share recently, but it's coming at the expense of Apple rather than Google. The story is different in the rest of the world, where Windows dominates and Chrome OS only has a 10% market share.
Source: https://www.zdnet.com/article/... [zdnet.com]
Re: MS : Do it our way or not at all (Score:1)
Who the heck codes on a Chromebook?
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Who the heck codes on a Chromebook?
Me, after installing Crouton and then some additional Linux apps.
P.S. I don't bother with Crostini
Re: MS : Do it our way or not at all (Score:2)
When you think about it, a web browser is a html/css/JavaScript IDE. Just press f12 and you have a wysiwyg console and debugger.
Whatever works (Score:3)
There are already tons of coding resources that are purely web based. I don't really feel mad that Microsoft is not adding onto that pile any more...
I think there is plenty of room for more well-crafted attempts at teaching coding on more serious platforms. A variety of approaches is a good thing, because not everyone will learn the same way...
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And there are even better ones that are document based.
The argument I always hear for web-based tutorials is that installing a programming environment is difficult. Okay, but that's what the first section of the tutorial should cover.
Re: Whatever works (Score:2)
I would say more annoying than difficult.
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The world has certainly changed from when we used to photocopy pages of magazines so we could go home and type in the code to see what it did.
Now downloading an installer (or opening a terminal) is too annoying.
and apple will be out when then go app store only (Score:2)
and apple will be out when then go app store only
What? (Score:5, Informative)
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I thought they had coders there...
Clearly you haven't tried using any of their software...
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You used to be able to run Minecraft PE/Bedrock edition on Chromebooks using the Android Apps subsystem (actually you still can if it was installed before MS pulled it). It's an android app and it runs perfectly on a chromebook (even has mouse and keyboard support). They pulled it as they want to push people over to MS hardware and see Chromebooks as a threat. Sure, they never released education edition on Android, but it would be trivial to port it since it's basically PE plus a few extra bits inside the w
And nothing of value was lost (Score:5, Insightful)
This "everybody needs to learn to code" is just complete nonsense. What these kids learn is basically changing a light-bulb and then they think they are an Electrical Engineer. The whole thing is somewhere between mostly worthless and counter-productive. My take is, it is inspired by cluelessness what coding actually is, a desire for cheap coders (engineers educated on the cheap, that will go well, and yes, coding is an engineering task, not one for technicians unless you stay on the level of that light-bulb) , and a pathetically failed attempt to understand what specialist skills humans will need in the future (for many, that will be "none"), completely missing that coding is engineering and that bad engineers are exceptionally expensive compared to much more expensive good ones. Eventually, we will have a lot less people doing coding on non-hobbyist level, because the economic realities are even harsher than in most other engineering professions: Saving money on the quality of the engineer is about the dumbest thing you can do and using a bad one because you cannot get a good one is even dumber.
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And there is also the ancillary benefit to MS of populating the coding ranks with rank amateurs to give the rest of the industry indigestion. Never trust MS.
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Hmm. You think MS is trying to sabotage the competition? While on the moral side, I would absolutely say this is possible, I do not think MS has the cunning or the skill. MS is evil, but also utterly dumb.
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No, everyone learning to code is a good idea. "Coding," at least the way the word is used popularly, is kind of like being able to hammer in a nail. Most people won't need to do it very much, but if you want to hang a picture or something, it can be pretty handy. If you're really into it, you can continue to learn civil engineering, architecture, carpentry, a bunch of other things that are necessary to expand your hammering nails skill into something more than occasionally useful.
The problem is that *all* e
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I disagree. Also on your take on education. Some very important subjects are not fun and not obviously rewarding for most people. Reading and writing comes to mind, most people do not actually like that. Mathematics (well, elementary algebra with in N, Z and R) is the same for most people. Not fun, cannot really be made fun and at the same time essential. Sure, you should be able to demonstrate usefulness, and occasionally "fun" can be had in basic education, but for most people, education will and has to b
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You seem to have interpreted my sentence beginning "the problem is" as me saying "I think this is a great idea."
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I have a friend who taught basic math at a Community College. The students were in a trade school program and had not learned basic math before this. Most of them passed the class and were able to do the math used in the rest of the program.
The biggest hurdle was their fear of math. All their previous experience was so awful that they were math-phob
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Absolutely, if your education system can't handle basic things, you need to fix that first. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be aiming to teach other skills as well.
I very clearly distinguished "coding" as synonymous with writing very simple, mostly structureless scripts. Learning that type of programming in primary or secondary school gives you a taste of what it's like, so you can decide whether you want to pursue it later, but is also a useful skill in itself. A little simple coding ability can make most
Re: And nothing of value was lost (Score:2)
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Sure, not everybody, but a lot more people should be able to grasp the very basics.
Using very simple statements in Excel shouldn't be wizardry.
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They are not. Most people are not really able to understand how that execution mechanism works. Excel is, incidentally, a lot worse than real coding, because there pretty advanced questions of convergence come into play. The damage incompetent use (what you advocate) of Excel has done is staggering.
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Yes, because being able to use a filter or conditional formatting in Excel should be reserved for the elite.
The damage I did by making a pivot table of a medium (for Excel) amount of data and filtering it was staggering.
And you should see the horror when adding a comma before a name suffix.
Re: And nothing of value was lost (Score:3)
Teaching kids how to program isn't any more nonsense than teaching kids music, arts, sports, story writing, etc.
The US (I'm biased, sorry) has a GIGANTIC talent pool, and we lose that advantage when we expect people to just fall into things by chance. A little exposure goes a long ways.
Even stupid things like taking the time to teach kids how to throw a frisbee the right way are worth it when thirty years later you're trying to get your own kids off their ass, and you only bought the thing because you know
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Programming is an absolute no-brainer. We get paid a stupid amount of money, and so much of the economy depends on our work, there should be more people in this field, it's too important to just sit back and hope we get enough people.
I disagree. There are far too many people in this field and most are bad. The population of people that can become really competent in this area is far too small to put _everyone_ through such a thing, especially when this is just a meaningless short-term exposure. Now, doing aptitude tests and giving those that do really well is something else. But that would cost real money and would sabotage the exceptionally stupid and suicidal plan of the industry to produce a mass of cheap coders.
Coding is not a gener
The lesson today little tykes (Score:2)
Chromebooks are a cancer, better than nothing (Score:2)
Chromebooks are a cancer.
Chromebooks are a better than nothing computing device. They are cheap, underpowered, and cloud dependent. Similar to the old dumb terminal for the mainframe, except instead of the mainframe, the chromebook is a terminal for the Google cloud.
Even if MS did support ChromeOS, the hardware capability is so dismal that Minecraft would be unplayable considering the programming API would be layered on top.
Chromebooks flourish, not because they excel at anything in particular, but because
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The hardware is fine. I used an Acer C720 with Fedora on it as my go-to field device for a year and a half. It was fine 85% of the time, at which point I would fire up the i7 laptop with the giant screen. This Chromebook was $130.
I only repurposed it to a kids' device because 2GB became untenable with multi-process browsers.
The new ones can run linux apps natively, so I might check one out again. My primary laptop is a Debian 10 machine now, but something lightweight to throw in a day bag is handy. Gro
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With the recent addition of android support as well, there are solutions to this problem even without using crouton and pals.
For instance, if you have an ARM based chromebook, grab a copy of ExaGear Desktop. (It's buyware, but is a proprietary x86 emulation environment with WINE version 3.0 tacked on top.) It emulates a pentium III class processor at about 1/2 the rated system's CPU clock. It should probably handle minecraft windows version. :) (and schools will no doubt hate it immeasurably.)
It can be di
Re: Chromebooks are a cancer, better than nothing (Score:1)
Well, if Android is supported, then the version of Minecraft needed (the non java version) is already supported.
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It's not the education edition, which is really, really amazing. You can write code to make it rain chickens. :)
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They are cheap, underpowered...
Well they can be, but they can also be expensive and powerful, at least at the hardware level. You can get some well spec'd Chromebooks. I don't known why you would want a Chromebook running on high-end hardware, but you can buy them if you want to throw money at a device that's going to be un-upgradable and unsupported at the OS level in 6.5 years from the date that model was first introduced (not the date you bought it from, the date the first unit of that model was put up for sale).
Inclusion is Hard (Score:1)
The education market is a territorial pissing ground for tech. Kids who aren't running with an 'in-tech' are excluded and end up feeling left out. We can do better.
Good (Score:2)
Good. Chromebooks are not computers. They are media consumption and tracking devices.
Re: Good (Score:1)
Chromebooks are used in school as word processor and spreadsheet devices.
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And for that, they are truly awesome.
My kid's school inflicts an iPad on us. What a terrible device. It turns everything into a game and has no ability to export data whatsoever.
With a Chromebook, you can get at your data anywhere, work offline, and export to a bunch of formats. Plus you get this weird thing called a KEYBOARD. And yet at the same time they're dead simple to manage in large numbers, unlike Windows boxes or Macs. They're a great education solution.
As for the Google-spying, yep, that's re
I wonder why minetest gets so little publicty (Score:1)
Many kids from my school no longer play Minecraft (after seeing what the others can do with Minetest) and I guess, if a school is serious about teaching code and letting th
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Agreed wholeheartedly.
If they were really serious, they'd be handing out Raspberry PIs, buzzers, LEDs, switches, photoelectrics, etc.
First world problems (Score:2)
Microsoft makes Phil Schiller look prescient (Score:2)
Earlier on Slashdot: Apple's Phil Schiller takes shots at Chromebooks, says kids are 'not going to succeed' [slashdot.org]
Hmm. (Score:1)
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Official Google Cloud Blog (Thursday, December 13, 2012): Chromebooks for student assessments and more [googleblog.com]. "Next February, approximately 1 million students from nearly 10,000 schools in the United States will participate in pilot tests developed by the American Institutes of Research (AIR) for the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. We're happy to share that AIR will now support Chromebooks as secure assessment devices to take these tests. This development follows our earlier announcement that the PARCC an
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I wonder if Google will eventually jack up the prices of Chromebooks since they are "secure assessment devices".
This is why Texas Instruments can sell graphing calculators using 1980s tech for $100 in 2019
Chromebook is an iPad (Score:1)
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You can code on your Chromebook just as much as you can code on your iPad. There is no way to install software like Eclipse, JDK, git, Maven, so you cannot really code. And to complain that "You cannot install Minecraft locally on Chromebook so Microsoft sux" is not logical. Chromebooks are not designed for this and Microsoft cannot do anything about it.
Well, my chromebook has a keyboard at least, and I can type code into whatever I'm logged into. I wouldn't recommend it, but doing that on an iPad... No.