Want to learn some programming languages, help!

https://learnpythonthehardway.org/

 

It all depends on what you're interested in. You've mentioned games, but do you have any interest in coding as a career?

 

Coursera.com has free college-level courses that you can take, Khan Academy also has lessons with several different languages.

 

if you want to actually learn programming, then i highly recommend freecodecamp.com. that's where i started from. yes, it's in javascript, but really, the language you start from doesn't really matter. many of the concepts are transferable. after gaining decent understanding of javascript in 2 months, i was easily able to learn the basics of ruby in 2 weeks.

also, i highly recommend projecteuler.net, coderbyte.com and codewars.com for learning basic algorithms.

lastly, if you want to learn ruby (it's an awesome language), i have some insanely amazing material for you. it's the 3-week pre-course prep work for this program i got accepted to, and it is by far the most competitive program around right now (for example, i have some classmates that are harvard and oxford graduates). if you can digest this material, then it will solidify your understanding of the basics of programming. also, last half of this material is all making games. let me know if you are interested.

 

If you want to program, but you want to have fun. go to codecombat.com to practice coding, well related to game programming logic actually.

 

appacademy.io is the coding bootcamp i'm going to be attending in december. there are lots of garbage coding bootcamps around right now, but aa and hackreactor are the only ones worth going to. and it is the only program that takes the tuition after the program, so they actually have active interest in what kind of jobs you get afterwards.

i had my own business for almost 2 years, and i started studying some coding in june. i got completely addicted to it, and realized that i want to become a coder and take it further than a hobby. yes, i can learn all this on my own, but i've spoken to some of my programmer friends and they all highly recommended aa. btw, i went to carnegie mellon, so my coder friends are some of the best of the generation. their endorsement of aa is good as gold to me.

yea, i went to carnegie mellon and studied public policy. i went to the best cs school in the world and i didn't take a single cs class. what a dumbass.

 

like i said earlier, it really doesn't matter what kind of language you start off in the beginning. you learn how to drive a car. you don't learn how to drive a ford or a toyota.

last week, i had to build a mastermind game and a battleship game. here are my whiteboards:





those are the problems from the ruby course i'm taking, but that knowledge is transferable to many other languages. since you want to get into game programming, i would really look hard into algorithms. projecteuler. coderbyte. codewars. the ones i listed earlier. learn to think in those terms. btw, the class i'm taking right now is just a basic fundamentals course. nothing hard or advanced.

a program is just data structure and algorithms.

 

If you want to learn real programming there is no way around having at least a basic understanding of C.

The most prominent languages are based on C syntax, and with C you learn what actually happens and what languages like Java, Javascript and many others take care of for you.

And while it may be frustrating to not have mechanisms like garbage collection or classes or dynamic types, it also is more simple and leaves less space for random obscure errors.

 

oh yea. knowing c definitely helps.
https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-computer-science-harvardx-cs50x

that's the best course for c

 

It's not the course that matters, it's your own willingness to solve problems. I bet there are many free online tutorials out there that will teach you just as well.

To learn programming you need to learn the basic syntax, thats the easy part. The hard part is finding problems you want to solve, writting your own algorithm without knowing that there is a "right" solution somewhere out there and instead figuring them out by yourself. Learning from others mistakes and not only your own. etc etc.

And of course rewriting your code a dozen times for different reasons.

 

btw, since you are interested in game programming, i think you'll enjoy this one
http://www.policyalmanac.org/games/aStarTutorial.htm

it's pathfinding algorithm. i'm working on making a maze solver right now.

 

A* and even Dijkstra is too much for a beginner.

Here a few examples i remember from my C-course.

- "Hello World" Program
- print out various variables: integer, float, null-terminated string
- convert a string with a hex number to a decimal number (ofc. without using atoi() )
- calculate factorial ( iterative and recursive )
- check if a string is a palindrome ( iterative and recursive )
- learn what a struct is
- create a linked list
- sorting algorithms ( bubblesort, selectionsort, quicksort )

 

I'm going to have to correct you here; learning C is NOT mandatory. Yes, it's helpful, but everything you mentioned can either be taught through a Java or C++ DS/Algorithms course. C is just a tool.

C programming's primary use is for low level systems and if you're not going to find a job in that field, or if you don't need it to get a BSCS, I see no reason to learn it aside from personal development.

RANT INCOMING (not directed to you):

There seems to be this mentality in the software developer community that you "have to love coding." Somehow if you don't dedicate half of your waking hours outside work to sitting in front of a PC and writing Javascript, you're a heathen.

Has it occurred to these people that some merely need a tolerable job/career so they can put a roof over their heads and still have some leftover savings for retirement? I personally find web development tedious, but it's not bad overall. You can make over 100 grand if you keep at it.

What truly irritates me is: do you see the medical/finance career communities telling their members that they "have to love their jobs?" Do child psychiatrists have to volunteer their extra time for "children in need" who can't afford their services?

All of this bullshit is just another ruse to make the peons learn every language under the sun while paying them peanuts. I've been looking at job boards for my own amusement and the HILARIOUS thing is that the "entry level" jobs expect you to know at a minimum 3 languages. For web development it's usually PHP, Javascript, and SQL. For desktop applications you should know Java, Python, C#, etc. Not just know them, but know them inside and out.

The question is are these corporations going to pay you for all that time you have to spend studying? Let's say you have a CS degree already but the job you interviewed for requires something obscure like Scala or F#. A truly talented programmer can pick it up in less than a week, a newbie might need 2 months.

BUT THAT's still unpaid fucking time and it's absurd. In the past corporations would even sponsor your Master's degrees, now you'd be lucky if they give you time off instead of working 10 hour days and then having to learn all that shit after work is over.

//RANT DONE.

 

>javascript

Ayy lmao

 

Javascript is fucking terrible but it's one of the most widely used out there