The Sierpinski triangle page to end most Sierpinski triangle pages
The Sierpinski triangle was what made me realise I have some talent as a programmer and is part to blame for my career:<p>When I was about 11 (mid 80s) our school got a shining new computer lab with original IBM 8086 PCs, and one teacher improvised a LOGO class. After a while we were divided into two groups of more advanced kids and the rest of the class. I was in the advanced team, and I think I was the only kid there who didn't have a computer at home and hadn't coded before. Anyway, we were learning about recursion, and the teacher gave us increasingly difficult tasks.<p>Then one day he showed us this triangle thingie, and told us to write an algorithm to draw it for the next class. I was shocked and stuck. Remember, I had no interwebs or even books on the subject. I spent hours in the computer lab banging at it, and couldn't do it. I went home, worried that I'll be the only one in the class who failed to do it - and that I'll be taken out of the advanced group. I was horrified, I was literally crying over it.<p>Then while taking a shower or something like that, the solution suddenly hit me. I ran to the school lab (it was open after hours) wrote the code and it worked. The joy and adrenaline rush of it was something out of this world, let alone the relief that I wouldn't be "downgraded" from the advanced class.<p>The next day in class, the teacher asked us to show him our code. It turned out I was the only kid who figured it out. It was one of the proudest moments of my life I guess, and I've been trying to recreate that rush of solving a hard task ever since.