A little help

[ficabj5]

Hi everyone,

I am 18 years old and will enroll to university this autumn. I will be studying computer science on TUe (Technical University of Eindhoven). A little more than a year ago I started learning c++ and am pretty satisfied with my programming skills at the moment. I do realize I have a lot more to learn but I am looking for a new challenge.

To cut to the chase, I cannot decide whether to learn Java or C#.

I will be learning Java at the university and can take C# classes as electives, so I am able to learn both at the university. I realize they are very similar in some ways and completely different in others, and it all depends on what I plan on doing with them. I would really like to do something with artificial intelligence in professional terms, however I don't want to learn it by myself at the moment (I will be learning it at university). 

Do you guys have any suggestions on what should I choose?

BTW: Is there anyone who is also going to TUe, I don't know anyone there yet

[IAmAndre]

To be honest, I don't think this is a dilemma. If you are familiar with C++, you can choose to get even better at it. These are just programming languages, they are not easy to learn as long as you master one. Plus Java and C# are both very close to C++ in terms of syntax and concepts. I'm personally better at C++, but when I got hired by a company who was using ASP, it took just a few days to be ready.

So in a nutshell, anything you choose would be fine, and learning one language doesn't mean ruling out the other one.

[Nuluvius]

3 hours ago, ficabj5 said:

I started learning c++ and am pretty satisfied with my programming skills at the moment.

To be brutally honest with you that is an incredibly conceited statement to make. I am not satisfied with my programming skills even now nor do I ever imagine that I will be. There's always more to learn and one should pity the developer who feels able to make such a statement at any level.

[vorticalbox]

1 hour ago, IAmAndre said:

To be honest, I don't think this is a dilemma. If you are familiar with C++, you can choose to get even better at it. These are just programming languages, they are not easy to learn as long as you master one. Plus Java and C# are both very close to C++ in terms of syntax and concepts. I'm personally better at C++, but when I got hired by a company who was using ASP, it took just a few days to be ready.

So in a nutshell, anything you choose would be fine, and learning one language doesn't mean ruling out the other one.

it's better for you to learn more than one. expanding ones knowledge is what life is all about after all and it gives you more tools to use so you can use the right one for the task at hand.

[AlTech]

On ‎7‎/‎17‎/‎2016 at 1:50 PM, ficabj5 said:

Hi everyone,

I am 18 years old and will enroll to university this autumn. I will be studying computer science on TUe (Technical University of Eindhoven). A little more than a year ago I started learning c++ and am pretty satisfied with my programming skills at the moment. I do realize I have a lot more to learn but I am looking for a new challenge.

To cut to the chase, I cannot decide whether to learn Java or C#.

I will be learning Java at the university and can take C# classes as electives, so I am able to learn both at the university. I realize they are very similar in some ways and completely different in others, and it all depends on what I plan on doing with them. I would really like to do something with artificial intelligence in professional terms, however I don't want to learn it by myself at the moment (I will be learning it at university). 

Do you guys have any suggestions on what should I choose?

BTW: Is there anyone who is also going to TUe, I don't know anyone there yet

C# is more akin to C++ and both can be used in tandem by using CLI.

 

I'd honestly recommend C# a lot more than Java.

[madknight3]

On 7/17/2016 at 5:50 AM, ficabj5 said:

I will be learning Java at the university and can take C# classes as electives, so I am able to learn both at the university

 

If you already know some C++, and Java is taught in your required courses, then chances are you'll be able to pick up C# relatively easy on your own and don't need to spend an elective on it if there's something more beneficial you can take. For example, a functional programming elective would be better in my mind. It'll teach you another paradigm instead of just another language.

 

In general, don't spend all your electives on learning new languages. Chances are you'll cover multiple languages over the course of your degree without needing to take a language specific course. If there are any languages you'd like to learn that aren't taught in a required course, just learn them on your own in your free time. I recommend you spend your electives on any language agnostic topics that interest you. Algorithms, complexity, software development, databases, networking, compilers, AI, machine learning, etc.

[Nuluvius]

12 hours ago, AluminiumTech said:

C# is more akin to C++ and both can be used in tandem by using CLI.

C++ and C# are completely different, they share some basic syntax and the 'C' but that is about it. As for using the CLI, that's managed VC++ not C++.