Tone/diction/sentence structure is a bit patronizing. I think Shaw was going for more basic than is required for most intelligent adults.
It's not really patronizing so much as "gentle" to non-programmers. I do however poke fun at programmers because non-programmers have some odd beliefs about coders being these gods that they aren't. By cracking little jokes are programmers I'm hoping to get them over this fear.
The patronizing part wasn't the non-programmer part and making fun of programmers. I actually loved the line about VI/Emacs. It was the overly simplified sentences. Let me dig the pdf out:
You can print things out with print and you can do math. The next step is to learn about variables. In programming a variable is nothing more than a name for something so you can use the name rather than the something as you code. Programmers use these variable names to make their code read more like English, and because programmers have a lousy ability to remember things. If they didn’t use good names for things in their software they’d get lost when they came back and tried to read their code again.
For instance in this section your actual sentences are very simple. Over and over you use these simple sentences. And you use an explicit "you". It gives the feel of a children's book (I don't know if you have kids, but if not, google for some of the books or ask a co-worker to borrow some). I think explicit "you" is fine, but the constant reassurance compounded with the sentence structure and explicit "you" feels patronizing.
Other examples:
You might not know it, but every time you put " (double-quotes) around a piece of text you’ve been making a string.
Most of these concepts will be exciting once you get them. You’ll struggle with them, like wrestling a squid, then one day snap you’ll understand it.
I know several people professionally who'd benefit from the book if you upped the "implicit respect" of the style a few notches. However, I'd be afraid to give it to a few of them out of fear of insulting them with the way some people will interpret the tone. I'm putting this out there in all earnestness.
Here are a couple books on two different styles which might be more applicable for the work. They are on actual explicit styles of writing, although the second pretends all writing should look like that.
Clear and Simple as the Truth by Thomas & Turner (Classic style).
Nonafflink: http://www.amazon.com/Clear-Simple-As-Truth-Writing/dp/06910...
Example of classic style:
When I was a boy, there was but one permanent ambition among my comrades in our village footnote [1. Hannibal, Missouri] on the west bank of the Mississippi River. That was, to be a steamboatman. We had transient ambitions of other sorts, but they were only transient. When a circus came and went, it left us all burning to become clowns; .... now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates. These ambitions faded out, each in its turn; but the ambition to be a steamboatman always remained. --Mark Twain
Style by Williams (Plain Style):
Nonafflink: http://www.amazon.com/Style-Clarity-Chicago-Writing-Publishi...
Example: After Peter the Great died, seven out of eight reigns of the Romanov line were plagued by turmoil over disputed succession to the throne. -- Williams edit to uncredited work on Russia
Another way to put that is the complexity/simplicity of the prose attempts to match the complexity/simplicity of the exercise.
I'm worried about people I might recommend it to (and thereby seem patronizing myself). With the current style, I'd probably only recommend it to kids and a couple adults I know very very well.
Encouragement and assuming the user only knows what you have told them (which you do in a few places) are the things that don't come off as "adult literature". Hell, a couple teens I know would feel patronized by that, and teens definitely take themselves seriously. The short sentence structure is only the biggest of deal because of the other two facets. You could keep your grade 6 FKA score but ditch the other two parts of the style.
As the tone is now, I'm pretty sure they'd take me handing this to them worse than a X for dummies book.
Not that the book is worth derision, just as a tactic for those who take themselves too seriously.
I know Zed's history. I'm not going to have issues using the book. But random non-programmers don't. And those are the people I'd hand the book to. I've got a thicker skin than some of them, and wouldn't care about the tone of the tome even if he directly insulted me. But THEY would. That's the issue.
i.e. When you hand it to them, say, "the language is overly simple and patronizing, but his approach is a good way to learn." Then your (apparently) big-ego friends can mantain their air of superiority while reading the book, without being insulted.
Not that I agree that his language needs to be changed; on the contrary I think is is great. I would have loved such a gentle introduction, at any age.
They're certain people at companies I know and work with professionally who ask me "Hey gte910h, what's a great way to learn programming".
I'm known as respectful yet blunt. If I handed this to someone, they'd wonder if I was saying they came off as retarded or that I had no respect for them (or programming is much harder than it is for the type of tasks they want to do).
For people who work in relationship based businesses (many non-programming businesses are), what others think about you is very important. The idea I thought them incompetent would be a very bad thing.
Some of the people I'd hand a book that went through the typing approach without the coddling part would hear the book loud and clear and possibly not remember the message I could use to hand them the book: "Hey, this guy who tends to be a bit insulting to people in some of his writing wrote a book on programming. He acts like you're a dull 11 year old throughout the book. But hey, his method is good".
These aren't people with big egos, but I'd sure as come off as having one about my profession if I tossed this at them. Especially if they handed it off to a third person who I never met but had heard of me.
I'd just be more respectful and less helpful and not ever mention the problematic resource. It's not worth the risk I'd lose a client over it.
>You aren't listening. He said to, "deride the language" and "praise the approach" to those you give the book to.
It wasn't clear to me the poster was talking about those you give the book to. It just sounded to me like he wanted me to give props to Shaw for his approach while saying he wrote in a manner some would take offense to.
As to Zed Shaw, I think I've honestly put in more work on the book already than 99% of the people who love it unconditionally have. I've read it in it's entirety and given suggested changes. Editors and critics are very useful when writing books.
He doesn't need to change the style. If he changes the style, he can market it as a book for adults and children. If he keeps the style the same, he should market it as a book for 12 year olds. Then, when someone hands a copy, it says right there on the cover "Yo, this is for kids" and no one get's insulted as you can reveal "Hey, this is really good, in spite being for 12 year olds".
As an aside, I like that Zed is very opinionated.
I'm not sure this book is a solution to that problem, but it certainly has a strong opinion.
I think a much more reasonable analogy is something like playing the harp. Most people see little point in learning, and many of those that try it won't have the aptitude/interest to actually become adept, but there are a few that will become masters.
They already are programmers. They just don't know it yet