Whats the Best Language to begin with?

[ozi]

I am new to programming and would like to learn how but dont know where to start... What should I learn first to help me later on with harder languages such as C++

Thanks,
ozi

[Kagey]

Myself, i started out with java, it is object orientated. I don't think it is really that hard to grasp, just get a good book and you should be fine.

[Radames]

I started out learning a little HTML then got into JavaScript. I liked programming but some concepts were hard to grab at first. Later on I began studying computer science and understood it better. But Visual Basic is by far the easiest tool / language to program with. And already knowing HTML, ASP was a breeze.

[jjmanton2]

i dont see why u cant start on C++. Honestly, it isnt as hard of a language as people make it out to be. But, if you wanna learn basic programming and get the feel for it, id say VB is an excellent choice. There is plenty of stuff out there for you to start out on, and it is pretty simple. Once you get the basic concepts, move on to C++ (or maybe C# if your so inclined to do so )

[Osnr]

Or maybe C C isn't really as out-of-date as people make it out to be, and it isn't hard, either. Nice intermediate step between VB and C++/C#.

[Dunghill_Dave]

People say that a little HTML is the best thing to star with, once you have the basics, then start programing. I started with QBasic, that was quite good, then this. But you may prefer a different language than me, or everyone would be doing the same - - for example, i prefer VB than the little java i did/attempted, but someone i was talking to today hated VB and prefered java...

Dave

[mrcc]

i started out with q basic but heres a warning dont start with c++ start with c first. once you finish c. then c++ will be a breeze

[usamaalam]

I started with C, clear all control structes in C, got the concepts of arrays, pointers, graphics, functions etc. from C and then moved to C++ and Visual Basic.

[AndySoft]

I started with VIC-20 BASIC, then QBasic, then VB, from version 3 to 6, and started HTML/JavaScript/Perl somewhere in there, and recently PHP. A bit of C/C++ and Java thrown in there. x86 ASM a couple years ago, most recently, TI-Basic and Z80 ASM for my TI-83+ graphing calculator.

In short, VB is good nowadays, I think.

[Venom555]

Originally posted by AndySoft
I started with VIC-20 BASIC, then QBasic, then VB, from version 3 to 6, and started HTML/JavaScript/Perl somewhere in there, and recently PHP. A bit of C/C++ and Java thrown in there. x86 ASM a couple years ago, most recently, TI-Basic and Z80 ASM for my TI-83+ graphing calculator.

WOW! You've really learnt alot of languages!

I started with Psion OPL programming, then I moved on to mIRC scripting. After a few months on that, I tried Infinity modding, for like 2 weeks... then I finally tried QBasic... I did that for a week... Then I finally decided to just go with the flow and take VB6, so after 6 months of that... I'm thinking of learning C right now... but I'm not sure if I want to... I've wasted my youth on programming .

Sorry if that seemed like I was telling my life story, but I'm bored.

[Mad Compie]

If you want to ride a bicycle, you'll first have to learn to walk.
I think, first of all, don't learn a language, but learn to analyze things as objects.
Nowadays, everything is a object in the most new high level languages (.NET, JAVA2, ...).
But also consider that flat programming is speedy, and OO not.
So for speedy programs (graphics, embedded, real-time, ...) program in C, Assembler or even DOS.
So, start comprehending programming techniques & algorithms, and then learn a basic language (JAVA2 is ok but VERY slow) prior to become an expert in C++.

[CornedBee]

program in C, Assembler or even DOS

DOS isn't a language...


If you want to learn C++ later, DON'T learn any Basic language (QBasic, Visual Basic) now. You can learn C if you want to, but I recommend that you start with C++ or Java. Java is easier than C++, but starting with C++ is still good: it's not as hard as people say, and once you know C++, every other language is a matter of a few hours to learn.

[Mad Compie]

Perhaps I wanted to write "DOS-based languages", not?
The old BASIC languages implement a lot of "goto" & "gosub".
But it was also VERY simple to program something. It could be a good starting alternative, but, who wants to use it anyway?
I think, nowadays, VB6 is a good alternative for the beginner, not?
Why make it difficult if you can do it the easy way?
I can do anything I want with VB6, except port steering and fast gfx algorithms. But I don't think a beginner will program such kind of things.

[CornedBee]

There aren't any DOS-based languages except batch files either.

VB is easy to learn, allright. But I have seen too many VB->C++ converts here having huge problems because of the way they programmed in VB to recommend this language to anyone who later wants to learn C++.

[Mad Compie]

OK, that's right.
I would suggest to start learning C++ if you really want to control everything, very hard for a beginner (because you'll have to know stuff about hardware, OS architecture, etc.).
Otherwise if you won't need these things in the future, just stick with VB6!

[CornedBee]

No, you don't. Or at least only very little. You can nearly completly avoid raw pointers in modern C++ by using such nice features as std::vector, std::string and std::auto_ptr.

[Radames]

Quit it you guys, youll scare the newbie away!

[CornedBee]

[Mad Compie]

I hope Ozi is still alive...

[CornedBee]

Nah, we talked him to death

[Radames]

He's probably washing cars by now...
Yall got too technical

[bobthebobert]

I started with QBasic, and now I am on to VB. After learning Qbasic, it was quite easy to learn html and then some php. However, I don't recomend bothering with QB, as VB is basically QB easier and better. And the reason I took QB and VB is because they were the onyl 2 programming classes offered at my school, and I knew learning it at school was the only way I wouldn't get sidetracked (A.K.A. start playing games)

[Mad Compie]

QBasic? When did you leave school?

[bobthebobert]

Lol, still in it. I learned QBasic last year. At the time I signed up for the course I had no idea what a programming language even was.

[Mad Compie]

I don't know of any school today offering QBasic courses.
Why not COBOL instead if it's only for learning a High level programming language?

[Kasracer]

I think I replied a bit late, owell who cares. I had time anyway

Originally posted by Osnr
Or maybe C C isn't really as out-of-date as people make it out to be, and it isn't hard, either. Nice intermediate step between VB and C++/C#.

If the ultimate goal is C++, learn C afterwards otherwise you'll carry ALOT of bad bad programming techniques to C++, unless you're a very good at un-learning.

Originally posted by Dunghill_Dave
People say that a little HTML is the best thing to star with, once you have the basics, then start programing.

Who are these people and did they have a lobotomy?

Originally posted by mrcc
i started out with q basic but heres a warning dont start with c++ start with c first. once you finish c. then c++ will be a breeze

No, very bad advice. Even the C++ creator suggests learning C++ instead of C if you want to just learn C++.

Learning C before C++ is not a good move at all. It will teach you many many bad ways of doing things, and unless you're good enough that you can say "C is a different language form C++" and THEN learn C++ without carrying over C styles, you'll have a much harder time learning C++.

Originally posted by Mad Compie

But also consider that flat programming is speedy, and OO not.
So for speedy programs (graphics, embedded, real-time, ...) program in C, Assembler or even DOS.

OO is still fast and 99% of all companies use C++ for graphics and real-time applications.

C++ is still very fast compared to C

Originally posted by Mad Compie

I would suggest to start learning C++ if you really want to control everything, very hard for a beginner (because you'll have to know stuff about hardware, OS architecture, etc.).

No! Don't scare away newbies to programming like that!

If anything, I feel C++ is much easier than VB. C++ is a very easy language, the programmers just makes it hard on themselves.

[CornedBee]

One of my main arguments against learning C before C++ is that C is far harder than C++.

Many tutorials on C++ teach it a strange way. They use C-style strings, C-style arrays and all these things that make C so cryptic.
Sure, they still form the base of C++, but the C++ standard library offers so many cool features (like std::string) that hide this complexity that a newbie can avoid it. Learn C++ the easy way first, and learn later how the classes are implemented.

[Mad Compie]

I have been programming embedded systems using assembler and C, so no C++!
C++ compilers exist for embedded applications but they are much slower in execution than if programmed in basic C.
Naturally, nowadays, people are programming in OO languages and this is really a nice approach. VB does it too. But QBasic not. and C also not.
It's up to you to choose what do you really want to program. Using UML schemes, most of the programming is already done!

[CornedBee]

C++ compilers exist for embedded applications but they are much slower in execution than if programmed in basic C.

I'd say it's mainly the compiler's fault. C++ is so complex (for the compiler) that it is hard to optimize. There's a large potential, and the difference between unoptimized and optimized C++ can be enormous.

E.g the program I just finished runs several times as fast in release mode as in debug mode.

[Evan]

[Grad1980]

I see that courses are using QBasic so in the simplest way they can communicate the concepts of storing information in variables and arranging things to be done by a process of steps ending with output commands. BASIC was designed for this. But it still had the problem of why should there be "string" (huh!?) variables and numeric variables. I was a computer lab assistant back in the 1970s and I remember a student asking me, "Can you put numbers in string variables?" I said yes and he wrote this very logical but invalid code:

PRINT "HOW MANY HOURS DID YOU WORK?"
INPUT H$
PRINT "WHAT IS YOUR PAY RATE?"
INPUT R$
P$ = H$ * R$
PRINT "YOUR PAY IS "; P$

Don't laugh. He was right.

The problem is that no one writes an elementary course for BASIC starting with Visual Basic. Visual Basic books always assume you've been working in some other language for years and start with difficult fol-de-rol of defining a form. It's as bad as COBOL or RPG where to write the simplest procedure to learn or teach the simplest concepts you spend hours deciding what the input and output should look like.

It would be so easy to start with VB. For the first semester the students would simply be told that for reasons that don't concern them now, they will start with a blank form called Form1. They won't define any objects on the screen. For reasons that can't be explained, all the code will be inside something or other called

Private Sub Form_Load()


End Sub

Because Visual Basic has the variant data type the students might as well start with that and we'll get bogged down in details about what is the best data type and why LATER.

You can take all the examples right out of the QBasic books. All you have to do is replace the INPUT statements with InputBox and use Print to print on the form.

Soon will come a program that produces a report that is more output than can be put on the form. (About 30 lines). The first control to be defined will be the ListBox which is replacement for sheets of fanfold paper. That's all that would be needed.

[meander]

for me i mastered html first, tried to do javascript, but i didnt get i at first, i did a lot of qbasic then finally moved to vb, for it was the easiest transition, sice most of the code can be used the same.

[philocrazy]

Whats the Best Language to begin with?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am new to programming and would like to learn how but dont know where to start... What should I learn first to help me later on with harder languages such as C++

Thanks,
ozi
---------------------------------------
for a novice is BASIC
for a professional is C/C++/JAVA
AND
FOR a philocrazy is THE ONE THE BEST -->PASCAL
my personal opinion!!

[CLibra]

I started HTML then I moved on to VB

[NoteMe]

HTML is not a language...

[manavo11]

HTML is not a language...

What is it considered then? Doesn't the L stand for Language?

[CornedBee]

It's not a programming language. And since the original request is this:

I am new to programming and would like to learn how but dont know where to start...

Markup languages such as HTML just don't fit the bill.

[NoteMe]

What is it considered then? Doesn't the L stand for Language?

Don't get smart with me....you know you always lose...


[Edit] Ohhh and CB should be in bed now too...

[manavo11]

Don't get smart with me....you know you always lose...


[Edit] Ohhh and CB should be in bed now too...

I know, I know... You're right

Are we all staying up late CB?

What is the characteristic of Markup Languages? Using tags?

[NoteMe]

Definition: a set of symbols and rules for their use when doing a markup of a document