newbie questions

[outhouse]

Programming can earn big bucks how long does it take to learn [spare time] and where is the best place to start and the best language to learn. Just curious maybe i'll enjoy it and get the hang of it quickly, mayne i'll find it puts me to sleep [not hard to do] :) I have heard it takes a special person any comments?

Thanks

[eh?]

i learned c++ from a book it only taught me the basics but tis a start, the book was 49, and the name is "Sams teach yourself C++ in 21 days" i did it in like 5 it hels you get the simple commands down

[greenring7]

Well... you're asking a lot, and we don't know exactly what your intrests in this are...

My guess is that you want to make money programming, and your main intrest are x86 applications (games, office aps, etc.).

I would suggest that you start out with C, move on to C++, Take a few days to learn HTML and Java (gotta get your bills paid one way or another), and when you really want to make your programs fly, learn assembly.

Well, have fun

-Robert

[eh?]

i wouldn't start with C because its hardly used and me not knowing it didn't hurt me at all....as for java, if you learn c++ or java then you pretty know 90 percent of the other language....

[Luie]

my first was C++, and i used the same book as drdingo21. (
I learnt the basics
now, am learning dhtml...(because there's a school project to do a web page...)

[outhouse]

thanks guys i'll give it a look, i'll do just about anything to keep from working outside everyday, hot in the summer and freezing in the winter. :) weather its programming or microsoft cert ive got to get out of this job.

[Luie]

We wish you good luck!

:)

[eh?]

once you get the hang of it, its actually pretty easy isn't luie???

[Luie]

yep, I agree.
:D

[Garfield]

The language depends all on what you want to do. ASM is great because you are talking as low-level as you can get (besides binary -- and nobody programs binary). You see everything that is happening. But, you are going to go program the next M$ Office applications because it's long and tedious. ASM is the greatest language for embedded systems.

C is a great all-round language. Win32 API was programmed with it (not C++ -- MFC is just a shortcut wrapper) and it is also used for embedded systems. It is not as "open" as ASM, but it doesn't hide much from you.

C++ is great for high-level apps. It hides some more that C does, but that is fine if you want to, say, program games.

Java is much, much slower than C/C++, but it is system independant. That makes it an easily portable language. Good for server-side clients.

So, what is it that you want to do?

--Garfield

[dreadlord79]

What about XTML? Do you have to learn HTML or DHTML first? I have heard that this is the web languge that is the "next thing" because it is faster and cleaner.

[Garfield]

Originally posted by dreadlord79
What about XTML? Do you have to learn HTML or DHTML first? I have heard that this is the web languge that is the "next thing" because it is faster and cleaner.

Do you mean XHTML or XML. I've never heard of XTML. Yeah, it is supposedly the future in web development (as far as markup languages go). I'm sure it's just as easy as HTML to pick up, but I don't really know.

[XWRed1]

i wouldn't start with C because its hardly used

You'd be surprised. Garfield already elaborated alot. Pretty much all Unix stuff is written in C++. All of id's stuff, except for the upcoming Doom 3, has been all C.

Knowing C is a good addition to knowing C++. You can mix C and C++ as long as you run it through a C++ compiler. It sucks to see something cool that you'd like to expand on with C++, but that something is in C.


Do you mean XHTML or XML. I've never heard of XTML. Yeah, it is supposedly the future in web development (as far as markup languages go). I'm sure it's just as easy as HTML to pick up, but I don't really know.

I wouldn't even consider HTML programming. More like document layout. You're not directing any logic flows, just writing a document. XML is pretty much a data-exchange thing. You output data in XML format, then use an XML parser (which could be written in whatever language) to parse the data, then do whatever you want (render?) to it.

[outhouse]

Originally posted by Garfield
The language depends all on what you want to do. ASM is great because you are talking as low-level as you can get (besides binary -- and nobody programs binary). You see everything that is happening. But, you are going to go program the next M$ Office applications because it's long and tedious. ASM is the greatest language for embedded systems.

C is a great all-round language. Win32 API was programmed with it (not C++ -- MFC is just a shortcut wrapper) and it is also used for embedded systems. It is not as "open" as ASM, but it doesn't hide much from you.

C++ is great for high-level apps. It hides some more that C does, but that is fine if you want to, say, program games.

Java is much, much slower than C/C++, but it is system independant. That makes it an easily portable language. Good for server-side clients.

So, what is it that you want to do?

--Garfield

Thanks for all of your replies.

Since i'm green as it gets when it come's to programming I dont know what i want to do as long as i can make over 40k a year i'd be happy. I'm just a green little feller looking for ideas and a place to get my feet wet :) honestly well drilling sucks

[dreadlord79]

Thank you for the response! I would like to start learning everything that I can but am a little slow even though I've an I.Q. of 149 (150 is genius on the scale I was tested at!).

[Valkyr]

Howdy folks,

I'm no fan of Microsoft but if you're looking for an easy language to learn then it may be worth looking at Visual Basic. Its real easy to learn and theres a hell of a lot of companys using it.

Only problem is it kinda restricts you to programming for Windows though. But it will let you do web stuff using ASP or ActiveX documents.

[XWRed1]

I don't know.... Visual Basic seems sort of demented in certain ways compared to the heavy hitter languages out there. If you start with it, you may be scarred for life.

I think PHP is a good (starter) language that integrates alot of concepts from languages like C++, but isn't as anal about you screwing up.

[Valkyr]

True....VB does kinda give you an easy ride in that it practically writes the code for you, its pretty good for doing ActiveX components though.

[Garfield]

The scope of VB programming is horrible, though. You can do almost nothing with it except to make a pretty GUI program. And with some hard work, you can do that with the core API and C.