i wanna learn how to program

[POTATODRAG]

i dont really know anything about programing and i wanna know it looks like its a lot of fun can someone help me learn

[Metallus97]

First: wich kind what do you wanna do in the future?

More like Apps for phones, scientific stuff or games?

[reniat]

What are your goals?

If you truly don't know anything and are starting from step 0, start with somewhere like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/wiki/faq#wiki_getting_started

[POTATODRAG]

i dont really know what can go from programing so i dont have any goals at the moment

[Metallus97]

For a basic start i recomend python. its verry simple structures and dont have to focus much on syntax and get your attention towards learing the basics

https://www.codecademy.com/learn/learn-python

[reniat]

4 minutes ago, POTATODRAG said:

i dont really know what can go from programing so i dont have any goals at the moment

then maybe look up a bit of info one what you want to do. development is a lot of learning how to do things through searching and finding resources, so consider this your fist development task: figure out some basic desires and goals you want to achieve through programming. A forum can't tell you want you want to do.

[AskTJ]

Web development? 

Game development?

Discord bot? 

App development?

 

Choose and we will help you.

[POTATODRAG]

something easy to start with

 

[Guest]

Front end might be fun. HTML &CSS gives you an easy way to make a GUI. Even though it’s just a formatter. Then you can go onto JavaScript. 

[Metallus97]

1 minute ago, fpo said:

Front end might be fun. HTML &CSS gives you an easy way to make a GUI. Even though it’s just a formatter. Then you can go onto JavaScript. 

This would be a verry classic aproach... but dont do it imo!

HTML/CSS is not Programming and noboddy writes his webpage per hand annymore.

Start with something like python so realy understand what eg. a if,else or a loop is

[reniat]

22 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

HTML/CSS is not Programming and noboddy writes his webpage per hand annymore.

but playing around with those frameworks wouldn't be a bad intro for someone who literally has no idea what they want to do with programming. Stuff like the codeacadamy basics tutorials.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Metallus97 said:

This would be a verry classic aproach... but dont do it imo!

HTML/CSS is not Programming and noboddy writes his webpage per hand annymore.

Start with something like python so realy understand what eg. a if,else or a loop is

Naturally. HTML and css can give a poor impression on what coding is like. 

However it teaches the idea of syntax & I’m sure some professional web developers said you have to understand HTML & CSS which won’t take long as with generally learning it. 

Python isn’t a bad approach either. 

I think web dev is great because you can work in notepad & just open your web browser. Additionally it lets you easily implement a GUI which is arguably easier to work with than some other languages & tools. 

Like C# in Visual Studio has windows forms but you can also choose to work in XHTML to make the GUI. 

[Metallus97]

20 minutes ago, fpo said:

Naturally. HTML and css can give a poor impression on what coding is like. 

However it teaches the idea of syntax & I’m sure some professional web developers said you have to understand HTML & CSS which won’t take long as with generally learning it. 

Python isn’t a bad approach either. 

I think web dev is great because you can work in notepad & just open your web browser. Additionally it lets you easily implement a GUI which is arguably easier to work with than some other languages & tools. 

Like C# in Visual Studio has windows forms but you can also choose to work in XHTML to make the GUI. 

sure dude. But IMO I think a "real" language to start is best.

I started with python for doing calculations and HTML CSS idd lear pretty fast then

[Guest]

5 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

sure dude. But IMO I think a "real" language to start is best.

I started with python for doing calculations and HTML CSS idd lear pretty fast then

I don’t disagree. 

I think python is another fantastic route. 

[Mira Yurizaki]

23 hours ago, POTATODRAG said:

something easy to start with

If you don't want to install something, then JavaScript would work in this case, because most web browsers have a JavaScript console you can use to run JavaScript code. Granted JavaScript is a language that once you get beyond the basics, can be confusing to get a grip on.

 

I'd also suggest Python for more or less the same reason, but you have to install it. That is, you can open up a command line, type in "python", and you'll be given a console where you can enter in Python code and see it work.

 

If command lines are too abstract for you, there are ways to get a feel for programming in other forms like:

• Games with map editors that let you program scenarios (I used StarCraft as an example, but StarCraft 2 also has one)
• Simplified game development suites like Game Maker or RPG Maker
• Games that use programming as part of the mechanics. Some of these ones on Steam look promising

Though you could also get Visual Studio since it comes with a way to make GUI applications, but your choices of languages are C/C++, VisualBasic, and C#.

[Dat Guy]

Write in C.

[mrstochastic]

The age old question, which is even more confounded with all the choice in languages and leads to decision paralysis. Need to take a step back and ask the difference between programming and a programming language.

My advice would be don't get too hung on picking the right language, but rather start by dipping a toe into the pool first, then walking in and as you learn to swim, go in the direction that interests you. It's a vast pool and don't think you can become an expert at everything, but that is not you say you can't try as it will help guide your interests. 

The biggest hurdle in learning to program is understanding logic and that the computer can't think, it can only execute. So pick a language with a low barrier to entry that is somewhat versatile, like Python, and remember that you aren't married to it. Even Excel VBA is fine at this point.

There are online resources, like wikis, Coursera, edx, datacamp which allow to take some courses at no cost which will guide you through the basics. Even getting a "for dummies" book from Amazon or the library is a great start. Once you have the basics down, then ask yourself "what project/problem interests me" and then go try to solve it. Keep it realistic, don't try to program the next Fortnite at first, but maybe a command prompt version of Scrabble. Sometimes you can find an online reference guide which will give you step by step instructions, other times you will get stuck, frustrated but if you know what you want to do you can usually find an example that's close enough that you can stretch it to work. That's why learning the logic is important because it will allow you to formulate your question properly. StackExchange will become your lifejacket.

After that moving from language to language becomes simpler, but not without upfront cost, like the time investment in learning the syntax and libraries/API so that you can efficiently program.

[Beskamir]

I recommend starting with learning Python or C# and focusing on the overall concepts rather than on the language.

 

On 8/4/2018 at 10:03 AM, Dat Guy said:

Write in C.

Of course you're still around recommending C to beginners and well I've began liking C++ a lot more recently (especially since I've been forced to use Python for a few weeks now) but I still wouldn't recommend C/C++ to a beginner. It'd just be overly difficult for them.

[Dat Guy]

Not everyone should be a dev though. 

[Cruorzy]

@Metallus97 Your signature doesn't work well with the night theme

[MyName13]

5 hours ago, Dat Guy said:

Not everyone should be a dev though. 

When I asked people on the internet how to get started with programming, what I actually had in mind was computer science, not coding or software development (computer vision, artificial intelligence, information security...).People who say "learn this or that" should think about this.I really hate how most people keep recommending javascript, html, css and php.

[reniat]

4 minutes ago, MyName13 said:

People who say "learn this or that" should think about this

to be fair though, when people who have 0 programming experience want to "learn to code", they probably shouldn't start with neural nets. Even if writing AI systems is their long term goal, the basics is still where they need to start. The venn diagram of people who don't know how to program, but also know they don't want to be an engineer is pretty small, since most people don't find what type of development work they want to do until they have a bit of base knowledge about how many systems work. Also, if someone wants to get into data science and doesn't care for code, they should start with heavy statistics and math anyway, not programming.

[MyName13]

8 minutes ago, reniat said:

to be fair though, when people who have 0 programming experience want to "learn to code", they probably shouldn't start with neural nets. Even if writing AI systems is their long term goal, the basics is still where they need to start. The venn diagram of people who don't know how to program, but also know they don't want to be an engineer is pretty small, since most people don't find what type of development work they want to do until they have a bit of base knowledge about how many systems work. Also, if someone wants to get into data science and doesn't care for code, they should start with heavy statistics and math anyway, not programming.

I didn't know any of that back then, besides, I highly doubt I wanted to "code" (is that what today's web development is usually called or what web developers call computer programming?).I'm not sure if the field of AI is all about neural networks, some people want to be researchers while others want to work on commercial products (someone who develops video game AI definitely can't be compared with someone who works in R&D).I thought that I had to learn all of these html, css, js and php frameworks in order to be able to make anything or to be able to program, web development shouldn't be recommended to beginners at all.

[cluelessgenius]

honestly ive been telling people i wanna be a softwaredeveloper since before i knew what that meant and now almost 10 years into it im starting to regret it as a career choice. my point is dont make your hobby your job and think hard if coding is really what you wanna do professionally.

 

or im misunderstanding in which case scratch everything i said.

 

in general id say it almost doesnt matter where you start. programming languages are a like learning to drive. yes every car drives a bit differently but in the end once you learned it on one you can mostly get familiar with others quickly. 

 

for starters i can onl recomend what i did which is c#.

basic hello world example and then once you understood the mechanics of object oriented programming youll find yourself anything but shoort of ideas on what handy little software tools you could program.

 

also the raspberry pi is a great tool if you want a more hands on hardware experience you basically learn anything on it. it support python, java, c#, c++ basically anything you want. im currently fiddling with python on it for the first time too. (trying to make an rgb strip adressable from the network )

[MyName13]

20 minutes ago, cluelessgenius said:

honestly ive been telling people i wanna be a softwaredeveloper since before i knew what that meant

How many people can really know what something is like?For example finding information about what infosec is really like and how to get into it is impossible.