Graphic Design Art 749a, Programming as Writing

“Learning to code through reading and writing.” This studio course introduces fundamental concepts of programming for the web. Stu- dents learn technical skills solely through the development of their own writing. The course asserts that programs should be written not only for computers to process but also for humans to read. While best practices are discussed, a variety of techniques that con-sider craft, tone, and style—challenging the notion of a singular, universal method—are discussed and explored. After being introduced to document structuring and semantic HTML, students learn PHP through intensive writing exercises. In this course, writing is considered a forward-facing web application, its constituent code, and the code’s annotation as written for a future reader. The course is intended for first-year students with little or no programming experience and is a prerequisite for ART 742b. Ayham Gharowi and Laurel Schwulst