So, as of 2013-06-30 20:42 (UK summer time) it’s 13:4 for “experienced programmers”, 10:2 for “moderate programmers”, and 7:2 for “non-programmers”. The “moderate programmers” are beating the “experienced”, and the “non-” are well within the margin of error.
Now, of course LW is a hive of scum and villainy^H^H^H^H^Hplace where even the non-programmers tend to be pretty programmery, and as Morendil points out the people who chose to take the test may be atypical somehow—but, still, this looks to me like evidence that this isn’t a very effective test for discriminating between people with aptitude for programming and people without.
Yes, I agree that the poll results aren’t too encouraging. It might still be interesting to try the test on a more general population, but without a follow-up to see who eventually learned to program it would be hard to tell how accurate (if at all) it was.
So, as of 2013-06-30 20:42 (UK summer time) it’s 13:4 for “experienced programmers”, 10:2 for “moderate programmers”, and 7:2 for “non-programmers”. The “moderate programmers” are beating the “experienced”, and the “non-” are well within the margin of error.
Now, of course LW is a hive of scum and villainy^H^H^H^H^Hplace where even the non-programmers tend to be pretty programmery, and as Morendil points out the people who chose to take the test may be atypical somehow—but, still, this looks to me like evidence that this isn’t a very effective test for discriminating between people with aptitude for programming and people without.
Yes, I agree that the poll results aren’t too encouraging. It might still be interesting to try the test on a more general population, but without a follow-up to see who eventually learned to program it would be hard to tell how accurate (if at all) it was.