Good programming language to learn?

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alexhicks22

alexhicks22

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Im wanting to learn a programming language in my spare time. In college i have kind of learnt c# but not very indepth. Any ideas what language i should learn? preferabble object oriented. Thanks!
 
As you've already made a start with C# I would be inclined to continue and learn it in greater depth. It's an excellent language and, together with the .NET framework, allows a beginner to write just about any program that they wish to.
 


another agreement here, if you are not that familiar with it, learn it better, then when you know C# well picking up a different language is easier
 



+1 to this



but if for some reason you hated C#, Java would be a good 2nd choice
 
Depends on what you want to do. Client side, server side, application. You'll find that many languages are rooted in other base languages and that you can easily learn more than one.

Personally, I know VBA, PHP, Perl, Python, ASP, AutoLISP, Oracle, MySQL, PostgreSQL, C++, C, Objective-C, Cocoa, XML, XHTML, HTML, CSS, Java, JS, Ajax, Ruby On Rails, *.NET - and those are just the ones I know "really" well lol
 


ZOMG!111onehundredandeleven

That makes you a cool and interesting person! I can't believe you didn't list the ones you only kind of knew or heard of!

😉

@OP: I'd echo what other people are saying by continuing on with C# or Java. Best of luck buddy.
 
I'm in the same boat man. This is my senior year in undergrad so a bit of personal advice. Once you learn one language the concepts you learn for the most part stay the same from language to language, and if statement does the same thing in C, C++, Java, etc. Just getting the concepts I've found that there isn't a hard language to learn. Currently I'm teaching myself HTML, python, and C/Cuda C nothing at all hard its just finding the time to do it.
 


I disagree with the most people here. Learn a "free" language. Not C#. Not a language owned by a company.
 
So that rules out Java (Oracle), C and its derivatives (AT&T) and many other languages. So what would you suggest? BASIC?

C# is as free as any other language. Let's not get involved in religious wars.
 


There is no need for a war. However there are certain facts. I am not talking about if a company made the language. I am talking about the if they are free or not.

And no C# is not free as any other language. You can only develop C# only in Windows.(I don't count Mono as free too) .You can only run C# in Windows. You have to buy C# development tools from MS. You have to pay $1000-2000 for an MSDN subscription. And what is C# language license? Free? No. Public, we all people "owns" it? No. Microsoft owns it? Yes. Only the company can develop and change the language? Yes.

On the other side,
Java is GPL(General Public Licence and it means your software is free as in speech) as many languages i counted below. So i suggest OP to try:

Java, C, C++, Objective-C, Python, Ruby, Perl, Awk, PHP, Lisp, Unix Shell, Haskell and other less known ones(Forth, ADA, Tcl/Tk, Erlang etc..)

They are cross-platform.(This means you can run them on any OS's). You can develop and run on any OS you want with free tools, no subscription, no license fees.

I don't see any reason to choose C#, ASP or any other MS language over these languages.
 
Oh dear. You are a little misinformed about C#. You mention Mono and then make the false statement that you can only develop And run C# on Windows. Obviously not true. And you compound the error by saying that you need to pay for C# development tools. Again not true. The C# compiler (ignoring Mono for the time being - although it is a very fine implementation of C#) is a part of the free ?Net development framework. If you want an IDE, debugger, etc. You can use the free Visual C# Express.

You can develop and run C# programs on most any platform without paying any fees. You can develop the program on Windows and run it on Linux if you wish (not so easy with C).

I'm happy to argue the merits or otherwise of various languages, but please don't perpetuate mistruths about them. I realise that you have no interest in C#, and that's fine, but the OP is already using it. It makes perfect sense for him continuing to develop his skills in a language that he is already used to.
 
I was referring to Visual Studio.(because nothing comes close it. In future if you want to develop a serious project probably you'll want to buy it) Yes you can but with Mono. And i mentioned about it. There is a jukebox software on Linux written with C# named Banshee.(likewise TomBoy, Beagle, F-spot etc...) But most people don't think good things about it, so i did not count it. Most users don't even use a software written with Mono. It is clearly an insidious move from Microsoft to support it.(Mono developed by Novell)

It is a breeze with Java, Bash, Perl, Php, Python, Ruby, Tcl. For C and C++ you can compile for Windows or Linux or whatever.

And nothing you say could change the fact that "C#" is a closed-source, not-free language owned by a monopolistic company.

If OP has a basic programming comprehension, the he can easily learn another language.

My suggestion is not to be "confined" in the world of Microsoft. But maybe the OP doesnt care about these things, its easy for him to continue in C# and Microsoft is just fine then C# is the way to go.
 
Visual Studio C# Express is free. You can do anything with it that you can do with any of the other editions. Personally I use notepad and the command-line compiler for a lot of C# programming.

To reiterate, it is just untrue that you need to spend anything, let alone thousands of dollars, to program in C#. In the same way, you can buy an expensive version of Visual Studio to program in C or C++ in Windows if you wish to; but you don't need to.

Let's stick with the facts and leave prejudice against Microsoft out of the discussion.
 


+1 to you good sir.

Coming from someone who spends his entire work day inside the guts of Solaris 10 and BEAWLS I've learned to detest the arrogance that penguin heads have about themselves. Linux is great and all, I've had extensive experience with Linux in both the corporate and in my personal office, but it's not the answer to everything. And IDE's are just fancy ways to manage code, there is nothing an IDE can do that you can't do through notepad / command line compiler. Hell you can even use vi to make code, although god have mercy on your soul should you chose to do that.

To the OP, if you've started on C# then continue on that. C++ is always a good language to be fluent in, for no other reason then to be able to understand others code and translate it as need be. I'd be cautious with Java, I've had very bad experience's working with it and BEAWLS, its fine to develop in but can be archaic to the end user (if I see one more java.lang.exception: line xxx) error from reading an XML file I'm gonna toss the box out the window.

BTW my first language was ASM on a 8086 then an 80386. You HLL guys have it easy.
 


+1 to the both above :)

I programed on every widely used OS today (Windows, Linux and MacOS) and there is always something that every programmer favours. Linux heads seem to just have that arogance built in themselves that nothing else is good but linux (like a kid when you say their dad is weaker than someone elses dad 😉)

If you started with C#, that is a good foundation to continue. If you wabt to learn any other language, the principales are the same, just the syntax is different.
Visual Studio Express is FREE in any version (C#,C++,web or all versions in one package http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/products/2010-editions/express ). In combination with SQL Express (also free), you can build great programs.
 
Don't get me wrong. I actually do most of my programming on Linux, using a mixture of C and x86_64 assembler.

But that's certainly not what I would recommend to the OP. (Nothing wrong with the C part, but ....) For Windows programming, C# is a very fine language.
 


Don't get me wrong, but I mostly recomend C++ to begin with any programing. It is harder to learn, but one you learn you can switch to any platform and any other language with all the basic concepts.

I just recomended C# since he has some knowledge in it...
 
I poretty much agree with the penguin and I love the microsoft IDEs .... free is the way to go ... as I posted in the other forum:

Do ANY programming language (object oriented or not), provided that it is free .... JAVA, php, .NET (has 30-day developer edition for free) ....... .NET is pretty easy to use out of the box, but lots of people have difficulty setting up JAVA and PHP and getting them running. For web programming, I think .NET (using C# or VB) is the easiest to start writing programs, but it is not free after 30 days. While JAVA (avoid JSPs for now) and PHP are a little tricky to get working, they are totally free and pretty powerful. I would probably choose JAVA (and I prefer Microsoft, but I dont think you can lose if you learn anything). Despite what the techno-nerds will tell you, C# and JAVA are identical (and VB.net and C++) are very similar as they are also object oriented. Yes, they have some differences ...... who cares about the syntax. If you only learn syntax, you are not learning to program .... to learn to program, you need to start understanding orders of operation, looping, conditionals, program flows and logic ...... If I was starting today, I would download Eclipse and use this as my IDE. It is what WSAD/RAD are based on and it is pretty good. Again, I am a Windows guy and I really think Visual Studio is and always has been the top IDE but, the JAVA platform has really come a long way and has closed the gap a lot.

I would use this study manual:
CCSU Chortle Site for JAVA (the entire series will be a GREAT, free intro to procedural JAVA and later objects).

Expect some small issues out of the box, but it really isnt that difficult. Find someone that you know that can do this stuff and use them as a mentor .... try everything yourself and Google any issues you have first .... it's just the best way to learn; figuring it out for yourself. Use the mentor (or forums) as last resorts only so that YOU are the one learning (and you dont anger everyone by being lazy) .... if you are lazy, then you will NEVER learn to program in any language. I don't know many languages well, and I seriously dont think there is a problem I can figure out on any platform (and I have done well on MVS, Unix, and Windows). If you are willing to try and research, then you can figure out anything. Once you get through that Chortle site, look to do some web programming or whatever else interests you. Remember, once you get the hang of it, there are an infinite # of languages to learn and more seem to pop up every day and if you learn something good from one, you can almost always translate that into something useful in another language or platform (they just call it something slightly different). BE PATIENT ...... THERE IS SO MUCH TO LEARN (even from a single language like JAVA ..... there are an infinite # of APIs that you can utilize). Have fun!
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