Facing the language barrier: Attempts at understanding an educational gap between coding and science using PlasmaPy

Coding is hard. Or rather there's a presumption that coding is hard. And it is. Coding languages are called such since it really is like learning how to speak to someone who doesn't understand what you know already. You write to them and if it makes sense, it works. If it's wrong, then nothing functions correctly. In this way, Coding can be punishing and discouraging to newcomers. It can take a long time to reach rewards when you have little or no guidance. And then there's other circumstances like the one I ran into, where someone else knows the science and I attempt to know the coding. Both of us ran into roadblocks trying to explain to each other what we knew and what we needed to accomplish. Saying that a language barrier exists between coders and scientists is an understatement in my opinion. However, despite these barriers we were able to collaborate and accomplish small but specific goals. Here I will walk you through the steps taken to develop modules in PlasmaPy for analyzing magnetic intermittency on the BMX plasma wind-tunnel.