Best way to get into it

[Mr alex]

What's the best free way to get into programming?

[desertcomputer]

Lydia.com, most library offer free access if you like account (Library Card) with library/school. 

[vorticalbox]

10 minutes ago, Mr alex said:

What's the best free way to get into programming?

pick what you want to make

find a language that allows you to do this

make thing.

 

So what stuff would you like to make and I'll list languages you can use for said stuff.

[tauwtech]

Besides Lydia there is a lot of stuff on youtube available. You just need to decide what you want to program. Especially what language, there are a lot of free ones and a lot of paid ones (meaning you have to buy a licence).

 

For web you can never go wrong with PHP, a lot of support and a lot of frameworks etcetera.

 

Besides a backend language you're gonna need to work on your HTML and CSS skills for webapplications. It's not a need but more of a must, invest time in learning the scripting language Javascript/JQuery aswell.

 

For databases I would like to recommend MYSQL to you or rather MYSQLi (the i stands for improved, it probably took a while before they figured that one out). PDO is another good route to take.

 

The best known free programs (Windows) I know of are:

Notepad++ and brackets for programming (typing the stuff etc)

WAMPmanager or EasyPHP for running PHP on your pc, it doesn't support it natively. These programs act as a sort of fake server. Besides this they come with MYSQl database and PHPmyAdmin preinstalled so you can manage your databases easily and right of the bat.

If you are going to upload it to the web you can use Filezilla for FTP transfer.

 

I thought of another source for you to practice with, Codeacademy . They also have a YouTube channel.

 

If you want to have a go at developing your own game (not a flash like game) you can try Unity3d

it's free and there is a lot of support for it to. A lot of info on YouTube etcetera. It uses Unity engine specific code and C#.

[Mr alex]

1 minute ago, tauwtech said:

Besides Lydia there is a lot of stuff on youtube available. You just need to decide what you want to program. Especially what language, there are a lot of free ones and a lot of paid ones (meaning you have to buy a licence).

 

For web you can never go wrong with PHP, a lot of support and a lot of frameworks etcetera.

 

Besides a backend language you're gonna need to work on your HTML and CSS skills for webapplications. It's not a need but more of a must, invest time in learning the scripting language Javascript/JQuery aswell.

 

For databases I would like to recommend MYSQL to you or rather MYSQLi (the i stands for improved, it probably took a while before they figured that one out). PDO is another good route to take.

 

The best known free programs (Windows) I know of are:

Notepad++ and brackets for programming (typing the stuff etc)

WAMPmanager or EasyPHP for running PHP on your pc, it doesn't support it natively. These programs act as a sort of fake server. Besides this they come with MYSQl database and PHPmyAdmin preinstalled so you can manage your databases easily and right of the bat.

If you are going to upload it to the web you can use Filezilla for FTP transfer.

 

I thought of another source for you to practice with, Codeacademy . They also have a YouTube channel.

 

If you want to have a go at developing your own game (not a flash like game) you can try Unity3d

it's free and there is a lot of support for it to. A lot of info on YouTube etcetera. It uses Unity engine specific code and C#.

I've tried code academy but I completely forgot about it

 

[Mr alex]

9 minutes ago, vorticalbox said:

pick what you want to make

find a language that allows you to do this

make thing.

 

So what stuff would you like to make and I'll list languages you can use for said stuff.

Probably just the basic stuff at the moment

[Mr alex]

29 minutes ago, vorticalbox said:

pick what you want to make

find a language that allows you to do this

make thing.

 

So what stuff would you like to make and I'll list languages you can use for said stuff.

And Lua for some gta 5 mod scripts

 

[vorticalbox]

12 minutes ago, Mr alex said:

And Lua for some gta 5 mod scripts

 

if you have minecraft they have a lua mod for it. might be nice to get going.

[Rohime]

42 minutes ago, Mr alex said:

Probably just the basic stuff at the moment

 

23 minutes ago, Mr alex said:

And Lua for some gta 5 mod scripts

 

 

Nobody has yet mentioned the power of PLAGIARISM and its cousin, Open Source.

 

I absolutely agree with a previous poster, before you can really "get into" programming you need to have something that you want to do, and that you will feel passionate about completing.    Without that it wont work, you'll just get rapidly bored and stop learning.

 

So ... find your project.  (HINT: start simple).

 

Next ... Find something SIMILIAR to your project as Open Source or Public Domain software ... use that to 

a) understand how it works (by BOTH learning real courses / books  AND inspecting and changing the code to make it do something else that you want it to do).

b) Adapt & evolve what you start with into something greater that is closer to where you want to go.

c) once you really screw it all up, then re-write it with a code organisation & structure that makes sense to you (and that you've learnt from books / training.

 

Then .... Do it all again with the next project.    I would recommend the next project be as divergent from the first as is possible given what you have learnt ... ie: Broaden what you are learning by doing different things each project.

[Cruorzy]

Find what you want to make, find a good way how you learn things. For example i like watching alot of videos then start making it. And once i feel stuck i might have seen its possible in a video so i fallback on that or maybe know the term to google it.

 

The critical point here is, MAKE SOMETHING YOU NEED/WANT.

It gives the most motivation to improve your project even once its done.

[Mr alex]

47 minutes ago, Cruorzy said:

Find what you want to make, find a good way how you learn things. For example i like watching alot of videos then start making it. And once i feel stuck i might have seen its possible in a video so i fallback on that or maybe know the term to google it.

 

The critical point here is, MAKE SOMETHING YOU NEED/WANT.

It gives the most motivation to improve your project even once its done.

 

 

1 hour ago, Rohime said:

 

 

Nobody has yet mentioned the power of PLAGIARISM and its cousin, Open Source.

 

I absolutely agree with a previous poster, before you can really "get into" programming you need to have something that you want to do, and that you will feel passionate about completing.    Without that it wont work, you'll just get rapidly bored and stop learning.

 

So ... find your project.  (HINT: start simple).

 

Next ... Find something SIMILIAR to your project as Open Source or Public Domain software ... use that to 

a) understand how it works (by BOTH learning real courses / books  AND inspecting and changing the code to make it do something else that you want it to do).

b) Adapt & evolve what you start with into something greater that is closer to where you want to go.

c) once you really screw it all up, then re-write it with a code organisation & structure that makes sense to you (and that you've learnt from books / training.

 

Then .... Do it all again with the next project.    I would recommend the next project be as divergent from the first as is possible given what you have learnt ... ie: Broaden what you are learning by doing different things each project.

What could I make? If you don't have any ideas that's fine :))

[Cruorzy]

31 minutes ago, Mr alex said:

What could I make? If you don't have any ideas that's fine :))

That is kind of personal, i like building websites.

Some people like creating apps or script to help them with something.

 

Find out if you want to develop an App for Phone/PC or maybe Start trying to create a website.

What should be the purpose of that app/website etc.

 

I loved to create websites for private servers for example, they all had a database. and i would just pull data from it and do fun stuff with it.

Like making a gear calculator, advice your next upgrade etc.

[Dat Guy]

4 hours ago, Mr alex said:

What's the best free way to get into programming?

Find a good language to start with (preferably by reading code snippets on e.g. RosettaCode.org). Then read tutorials about that language.