Do programmers enjoy video tutorial or written tutorial ?

L

Linuxmank

Dear Member,

I am just curious to know, do programmers like video tutorial or
written tutorial in general ?
Any feedback from programmers are much appreciated.

Many Thanks
 
S

Stefan Ram

Linuxmank said:
I am just curious to know, do programmers like video
tutorial or written tutorial in general ?

Programmers enjoy on-topic posts, that is, posts
regarding particular features of the programming
language Java in comp.lang.java.programmer.
 
D

Donkey Hottie

Linuxmank said:
Dear Member,

I am just curious to know, do programmers like video
tutorial or written tutorial in general ?
Any feedback from programmers are much appreciated.

Many Thanks

Some programmmers enjoy sausage, others more like sex. Old and tired dogs
may enjoy beer on their free time.
 
L

Linuxmank

  Programmers enjoy on-topic posts, that is, posts
  regarding particular features of the programming
  language Java in comp.lang.java.programmer.

Thanks for the comment Stefan. But post be can video or written
right ? I am a programmer myself and enjoy both type of post but all I
need is a general point of view because I am about to write a
tutorial.
What will be the use of the tutorial if my fellow programmer will not
likely go for it due its nature.
Hope that make sense.

Many Thanks
 
L

Linuxmank

Some programmmers enjoy sausage, others more like sex. Old and tired dogs
may enjoy beer on their free time.

Thanks Donkey Hottie,

you just made me laugh.

Most of us programmers are busy people working on some kind of
projects. Having a video tutorial can provide some quality time with
learning as well but on the other hand reading tutorial can be fast
all we can do is skim the main points of the post and move on.

I am still confused because both seems good to me

Thanks
 
M

Martin Gregorie

Dear Member,

I am just curious to know, do programmers like video tutorial or written
tutorial in general ?
Any feedback from programmers are much appreciated.
Straight answer: I much prefer written material because:

1)the bandwidth of a talking head video or a powerpoint-type presentation
is *much* lower than that of reading a text version of a tutorial at my
own speed. As a result I'm wasting time watching a video when I could be
reading it instead.

2)well laid-out written text is much easier to use as reference material.
 
L

Linuxmank

Straight answer: I much prefer written material because:

1)the bandwidth of a talking head video or a powerpoint-type presentation
  is *much* lower than that of reading a text version of a tutorial at my
  own speed. As a result I'm wasting time watching a video when I could be
  reading it instead.

2)well laid-out written text is much easier to use as reference material.


Many Thanks Martin,

Thanks for taking time to respond

Much Appreciated
 
W

Wojtek

Martin Gregorie wrote :
Straight answer: I much prefer written material because:

Sitting at my desk listening to a droning voice puts me to sleep.

Most programming video tutorials are done by programmers. And we tend
not to be very exciting (ok, ok, "ducks").

You hear a bored voice and see a mouse cursor moving around:
"And then you click here and this happenes, then you click there and
that happens, and you see this result."

Not sure how to liven this up, maybe a dance team in skimpy clothing
illustrating actions? Some lithe young thing running around the screen
mimicing a cursor?

But please NO background music.
 
B

Bill McCleary

Linuxmank said:
Thanks Donkey Hottie,

you just made me laugh.

Most of us programmers are busy people working on some kind of
projects. Having a video tutorial can provide some quality time with
learning as well

Now who will be the first to link the topics of "sex" and "video
tutorial" in a way that many here might find enlightening?
 
D

Dirk Bruere at NeoPax

A

Arne Vajhøj

Linuxmank said:
I am just curious to know, do programmers like video tutorial or
written tutorial in general ?
Any feedback from programmers are much appreciated.

Written.

Video has a "Learn to sell snow on the north pole and
sand in Sahara in 7 days" aura.

Arne
 
R

Roedy Green

I am just curious to know, do programmers like video tutorial or
written tutorial in general ?
Any feedback from programmers are much appreciated.

Written by far. The reason is searching. I can use google or other
tools to find what I want. Video tutorials have no indexing. Usually
I don't want the whole tutorial, or I am trying to find a tutorial on
some specific point.


A tutorial on how to build a cable or assemble something would be
better on video.

On my todo list is a student project to invent a transcribed video
format with searching ability.
--
Roedy Green Canadian Mind Products
http://mindprod.com

"Let us pray it is not so, or if it is, that it will not become widely known."
~ Wife of the Bishop of Exeter on hearing of Darwin's theory of the common descent of humans and apes.
 
D

Daniel Pitts

Linuxmank said:
Thanks Donkey Hottie,

you just made me laugh.

Most of us programmers are busy people working on some kind of
projects. Having a video tutorial can provide some quality time with
learning as well but on the other hand reading tutorial can be fast
all we can do is skim the main points of the post and move on.

I am still confused because both seems good to me

Thanks
A video tutorial is all but useless for non-novice programmers. The
written word is far more efficient at imparting information. The most
valuable learning tool a programmer can use is a complete example that
can be played with, altered, and explained.
 
A

Arved Sandstrom

Linuxmank said:
Thanks for the comment Stefan. But post be can video or written
right ? I am a programmer myself and enjoy both type of post but all I
need is a general point of view because I am about to write a
tutorial.
What will be the use of the tutorial if my fellow programmer will not
likely go for it due its nature.
Hope that make sense.

Many Thanks

It sounds like a serious question, so I'll answer it seriously. I
personally cannot stand video tutorials, not with respect to software
development. If I want to get a better idea how to tie a fishing fly, or
do a tuneup on an older style car, I can appreciate a video. But text
with images is much more efficient at delivering information about
software development than a video could ever be.

I must confess: the whole concept of programming videos strikes me as so
wrong that I've never watched one, and I doubt I ever will. :)

AHS
 
B

Bill McCleary

Wojtek said:
Martin Gregorie wrote :

Sitting at my desk listening to a droning voice puts me to sleep.

Most programming video tutorials are done by programmers. And we tend
not to be very exciting (ok, ok, "ducks").

You hear a bored voice and see a mouse cursor moving around:
"And then you click here and this happenes, then you click there and
that happens, and you see this result."

Not sure how to liven this up, maybe a dance team in skimpy clothing
illustrating actions? Some lithe young thing running around the screen
mimicing a cursor?

"Yes, there are three N's ... Spin again."
 
A

Andrew Thompson

On Aug 6, 8:40 am, Daniel Pitts

Most of this has been said before, so I am just here to
'agree' with the views already expressed.

....
A video tutorial is all but useless for non-novice programmers.
++

..The
written word is far more efficient at imparting information.  The most
valuable learning tool a programmer can use is a complete example that
can be played with, altered, and explained.

My build files of the JWS API do that, and have become
quite popular (in a very limited field).

Now, to veer into a rant of my own..
<rant>
Who but 'script kiddies' could benefit from a video
tutorial? About the only thing I could imagine was
well explained in a video tutorial is (for example)
using the Netbeans GUI Editor (which most experienced
programmers would not bother using at all).

But even then, I would want the textual (with a couple
of pictures, where relevant) description.

Even better is wrapping up the entire help/tutorial
in JavaHelp, so the student can easily do searches
within the documentation.
</rant>

OTOH to all this, I suspect video tutorials will
become more popular (than they are now) over time.

The 'younger people' have a less finely attuned sense
of appreciating just how many bytes are involved in
downloading a video. The popularity of streamed video
& music, as well as the mostly wasted bandwidth of
YouTube (wasted in the sense the content is not saved,
just viewed & discarded) supports that most web surfers
these days would not think twice about downloading N
Meg of video, just to learn how to hard-boil an egg.

There might also be a slight 'younger people prefer
moving pictures' aspect to it, but I cannot see that
applying too much to people who are actually capable
of programming (as opposed to the myriads that might
try).
 
S

sunny kapoor

Sadly, complete examples are often used without being understood,
which can be dangerous, especially to a subsequent maintainer :)

   BugBear

Guys,

Thank you very Much for taking time and responding to my question.
Seriously it was overwhelming.
Guys in-order to thank you I have moved this question and answer(of-
course) to my blog.
Thanks you very much

link of the blog is mentioned below.
Please for further contribution do comment on the blog, it will also
help blog's subscribers as well.

Link to the blog : http://thegeekhead.blogspot.com/2009/08/video-tutorial-vs-written-tutorial-for.html


Much Appreciated


Many Thanks
L
 
S

sunny kapoor

Sadly, complete examples are often used without being understood,
which can be dangerous, especially to a subsequent maintainer :)

   BugBear

Guys,

Thank you very Much for taking time and responding to my question.
Seriously it was overwhelming.
Guys in-order to thank you I have moved this question and answer(of-
course) to my blog.
Thanks you very much

link of the blog is mentioned below.
Please for further contribution do comment on the blog, it will also
help blog's subscribers as well.

Link to the blog : http://thegeekhead.blogspot.com/2009/08/video-tutorial-vs-written-tutorial-for.html


Much Appreciated


Many Thanks
L
 
L

Linuxmank

You copied this thread to your blog without attribution to USENET.

Do you think that's honest?

   BugBear

OPs ok i will do that now...btw Linuxmank = Sunny kapoor
 

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