I have a lot of free time on my hands right now, and I thought rather than letting it go to waste, I'd like to do something constructive, and learn some programming skills.
What's a good programming language to learn as my first?
I don't know if the text boards are like the image ones, if so I'm expecting a lot of rage and unhelpful comments.
Alright thanks, I wasn't expecting responses so quickly.
I'll read through SICP as recommended and do the exercises.
Is Clojure more useful than Scheme, or is it just a good learning experience trying to do the exercises in a different language?
Clojure is more useful than Scheme, but it's still young.
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Guido Van Possum Fan2009-01-15 22:46
Perhaps I should mention for your own good that starting with Python, A.K.A. THE FORCED INDENTATION OF CODE, is an easier and far more practical choice with common usage in scientific communities and for elaborating small programs.
Scheme is a good language for opening your mind, but you should keep the candy for later and learn something practical first.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 0:55
newLISP is more useful than Scheme, and it is very mature.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 1:10
>>13
Quit making fun of the newLISPers. They don't know any better.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 1:18
>>12
As much as I hate this poster, his point is valid. Python is a superior scripting language to start with. You don't want to dive right into handling memory and pointers and stuff without knowing how to code in the first place.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 2:43
>>15
Funny, that's how I started and I turned out okay. Of course, if you want to be mollycoddled and coo'ed gently by your toy language interpreter, then that's your prerogative.
C, haskell, forth, or javascript.
then learn the others. once you've learned all 4, you should be able to handle anything.
well, except maybe lisp. your brain needs to be wired right for counting parentheses, it's not something you can just learn.
>>16
You're playing a dangerous game, anon. I recognize that you are trolling, but I will answer as though you are not so as to give the OP some insight into my reasoning.
Nowhere did I state that he would not turn out fine, I just think it's silly that people with no programming experience would dive right into a more difficult beast to control and a much more difficult beast to optimize. Lots of people that do this end up getting pissed off because they end up understanding very little of what they're doing.
Also, I don't use Python. I learned it a couple weeks ago and decided that the syntax was not favorable. I much prefer Lua if I'm going to be scripting.
>>18 your text editor needs to be wired right for counting parentheses, it's not something you can just learn.
Fixed that for you.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 13:02
The correct answer is naturally ``Read SICP.'' Clojure is currently the most useful Lisp dialect and you should learn it, but using it for the exercises wouldn't make much sense.
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Anonymous2009-01-16 13:06
>>18
Which is less frustrating, counting parentheses or stackrobatics?
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Anonymous2009-01-16 13:37
>>24
Stackrobatics, because you can abstract it all away and not deal with it.
>>34
You could write your own though. They would just have to be compiler words instead of higher-order words. Anyway, I didn't specifically mean combinators when I said you can abstract it away. While those are a great tool for doing so, in a Forth context it would be more normal to hide any stackrobatics away in low-level code. The point being: much of a Forth program can avoid stackrobatics entirely, while every line of Lisp needs a bunch of parens. It doesn't make Lisp less awesome, but that's not what the question was about.
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Anonymous2009-03-06 7:33
Without proof is unscientific and ultimately destructive b The Ginger Everyone envies him?