Neil Brown

Senior Research Fellow in computing education at King's College London making BlueJ and Greenfoot Java IDEs. Mastodon: @[email protected]

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

New paper (w/ @michaelkolling and others): "Novice use of the Java programming language", available in TOCE and at https://t.co/O64RH9F8DF We looked at which language/library features novices use in Java+BlueJ over an 8 year period - here's a short thread on our findings.

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

I'm currently recruiting Java educators for a study evaluating potential hints for Java novices. Will take ~30 minutes total to do a solo online task+survey, can be done whenever and wherever you like. If you're interested to participate, email me at [email protected]

[John Burn-Murdoch @jburnmurdoch]

Key chart to keep in mind as the Conservatives suffer their worst ever defeat:

The Tories didn’t lose this election because they were too right wing on some issues or too left wing on others.

They lost because voters of all stripes judged them to be incompetent and dishonest.

[Policy Sketchbook @policysketch]

It's always a good rule of thumb to assume that, when someone has won or succeeded at something, the people who are anointing them as a genius are underestimating the role of luck.

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

From a junk email I received. That final line is quite the collision of IP law and theology.

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

Found an old leaflet from an insurer about the millennium bug, featuring this work-of-art paragraph: "The approach of the year 2000 is not insurable."

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

@Felienne You see, the thing is: until you got involved, tech had never previously been gendered via logical fallacies and non-sequiturs; it was 100% gender neutral. 🙄.

[Florian Ederer @florianederer]

The great Danny Kahneman has passed away. His contributions to behavioral economics are immense.

Nothing describes his quirky personality more accurately than the fact that I own @R_Thaler's book and dedication to him because Kahneman sold the book at a yard sale in Princeton.

[Lewis Goodall @lewis_goodall]

NEW: Water companies released record spills of raw sewage into England's waterways in 2023.

The increase was huge. 3.6m hours of spills in 2023 vs 1.75m hours in 2022.

They should only happen exceptionally. Water UK accepts it's unacceptable but said it was due to heavy rain.

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

@janewaite Mentioned in despatches!

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

"Results show that students tend not to follow test-driven development practices, even when explicitly directed to, and tend to create unit tests only to earn assignment credit rather than to guide their software development." https://t.co/rjHpdry34x

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

@guzdial Looking good!

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

#SIGCSE2024 Today, 1345, room D135, @guzdial and me on Big vs Rich Data: twenty minutes, two costumes, one montage of work by an early 20th century Dutch painter, three slide styles; two twits, one swing for the fences. Come and watch it go down (perhaps in flames).

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

@analog_ashley Feels like a glitch to have them scheduled against each other, given the author overlap!

[Tim Leunig @timleunig]

Everything in this thread is correct. Housing supply matters. Here's hoping the next government really gets it. (mixed signals so far)

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

@ProfTomCrick The wikipedia page has a relevant take on how Bognor gained the Regis part: https://t.co/dt9Mv7egVy

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

"It means 'blessed by kings'" - guy on the plane yesterday aiming to impress an American woman with his description of his home town, Bognor Regis.

[Luca Soldaini 🎀 @soldni]

“Our estimates suggest that 10.6% of ICLR 2024 review sentences and 16.9% for EMNLP have been substantially modified by ChatGPT” 🫠

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

And now next week we return to the scene of the crime for SIGCSE 2024! Looking forward to it, but hoping it all turns out differently this time. (In hindsight: what would I have done differently? Not go!)

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

Today is exactly four years since I returned home after presenting at, without really attending, the cancelled SIGCSE 2020. Here's some memories of a unique trip...

[Neil Brown @neilccbrown]

I flew out that evening; two flights and three train journeys later, I was home. The UK entered lockdown just over a week later. That morning in Portland was the last time I would see Pierre and Michael in person for a year.