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Discussion on: Do you need to be good at math to be a programmer?

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ravavyr profile image
Ravavyr

Personally I think Programming requires a certain level of "mathiness" in a person.

Where Web Development [which is what I do] requires far less and is far simpler to do. Web is also more artistic in that much of what we do is "in the eye of the beholder" versus strict rules to follow. And we're beholden to "the design" and "business needs" that are about as fixed as a drunk guy stumbling out of a bar at 3am. What makes web hard is keeping up with the changes and being flexible enough to adjust everything on a whim in the interfaces, little math involved.

When writing programs, eg desktop stuff like microsoft office, filezilla, or browsers, etc, there's a lot more "mathiness" to them, where most websites at most handle some click events and have a few database queries that don't get more complex than joining two tables. Game development is also programming as far as the mathy complexity goes. When dealing with matrixes or 3D object manipulation/detection, those things get "mathy" quick. If you don't think those thngs are mathy, it's because you're a mathy person who gets it. A great many of us, just don't.

There are exceptions to every rule and every generalization has holes in it, but this is what i stand by.

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jimajs profile image
Jima Victor

Well said friend!👏 👏