Re: noob
Re: noob
- Subject: Re: noob
- From: Alastair Houghton <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 18 Dec 2007 13:34:13 +0000
On 17 Dec 2007, at 02:53, draper jones wrote:
i'm a noob to programming. where should i begin to learn or what
book or books should i get????
You *might* be happier learning an interpreted language first, perhaps
Python or RealBASIC or something, just to get used to the ideas behind
programming, especially if you've never written any programs before.
Certainly interpreted languages are less daunting and they have a
faster turnaround, which makes it easier to learn. They also have the
merit that they generally don't crash outright, and when something
does go wrong you usually have better debugging facilities available.
I started with BASIC in the early 1980s, so the idea of starting out
with an interpreted language is one that I have some familiarity with.
Otherwise I recommend:
1. Learn ANSI C. *Not* C++, and not Objective-C (not straight away,
anyway). **MAKE SURE** that you understand pointers, strings and
arrays because those are the things people have most trouble with and
they're actually very straightforward when you understand them. If
you're confident writing e.g. a program that can read ten numbers from
the terminal and print the largest, smallest, arithmetic mean, mode,
etcetera, it will stand you in good stead for Objective-C. I think
the importance of being able to write simple *non-graphical* programs
like this is often understated.
2. (For the Mac) Learn Objective-C and Cocoa. Because ObjC is a
*thin* wrapper over ANSI C, you'll find the new concepts easy to pick
up. If you try to learn ObjC first, you may find that you don't
understand the basics of C, which will cause you problems in some areas.
3. If you want, learn C++. C++ can be useful sometimes, and many Mac
developers use it extensively in their apps. But make no mistake; C++
is an unpleasantly complicated language that isn't even understood by
most of its practitioners. While it is undeniably powerful and
sometimes very useful, I would be inclined to avoid it where
possible. If you want to work on Windows programs, you'll probably
need basic C++ know-how (or, for some newer software, C#). On the
Mac, it isn't really necessary to learn C++ straight away. You'll
find C++ easier to learn after ObjC because many of the OO concepts
from ObjC exist in C++ also in one form or another.
As far as books go, I know people commonly recommend Stephen Kochan's
book on C; there's also Kernighan & Ritchie (but if you're looking in
a public library, make sure you get the ANSI C edition as they might
have the first edition floating about). And Aaron Hillegass (of Big
Nerd Ranch fame) probably has the most popular Cocoa book. More
experienced programmers might prefer Anguish, Buck and Yacktman
("Cocoa Programming"), but it is a little dated now whereas I think
Aaron is readying a new version of his book.
Kind regards,
Alastair.
--
http://alastairs-place.net
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