I started reading http://pine.fm/LearnToProgram/ today and I just finished "A few things to try" under 6. flow control. I know it's silly but it feels really satisfying even though what I've done is really simple and I probably did it in the worst way possible. I hope it stays this fun because I could see myself learning something from this.
Share your fun programming learning methods here or something. Or just point and laugh at my newbiness. Or tell me how much Ruby and Java sucks. Whatever is fine
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Anonymous2006-06-04 12:03
Ruby rocks. Java sucks.
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Anonymous2006-06-04 12:28
i know ruby rocks, but java is an island
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Anonymous2006-06-04 12:37
ruby rocks. java island. c letter. there wolf. there castle.
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Anonymous2006-06-04 13:16
If you are first getting into programming (as it seems), you really shouldn't start with a language like ruby. It will sour your ability to code with style because of it's syntactic sugar. If you want to script, use something more structure (and better in pretty much every way): Python.
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Anonymous2006-06-04 13:34
>>5
Aw shit, now we're getting advice from highschoolers.
Everything beyond symbols and infinite tape is syntactic sugar, Herr Fanboi. You probably don't know what I'm talking about, do you?
>>1
Something you will want to know; in case you would have attempted anything similar with most languages other than Ruby, your experience would not have been a good one. Programming in Ruby is fun, programming in for example C++ is interesting (due to all the hacks you have to re-invent) and gets boring after a while. With Ruby, you can simply focus on churning out code.
9, I first read that joke more than 10 years ago, can't believe it's still making its round. But it's dated though. Who still teaches Pascal in college anyway...
I thought so. If it had been more recent, the "senior year in college" language would probably be Java or something.
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Anonymous2006-06-04 22:48 (sage)
lol, i learned pascal and java while i was in high school
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Anonymous2006-06-05 3:13
I was taught Java for 3 years at university, and as a result decided I did not in fact love programming, and would become an IT guy instead. Then I read David Touretzky's "A Gentle Introduction to Symbolic Computing" and was born again. Lisp uber alles!
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Anonymous2006-06-05 3:30
Java almost destroyed my interest in CS too. Luckily, I then went to a real (read: non-shitty) university, and all was good.
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Anonymous2006-06-05 3:34
Actually, Pascal is good for a start. It's piss simple, which is something you want, it doesn't have lots of features nor a huge standard library, which is what you want (students should learn to do stuff by themselves, then use libraries, and they shouldn't be troubled by them), and it has every element I consider necessary for a start. Then you can move on to modern languages, for which I'd recommend Python.