I respectfully disagree.

C is a GREAT language.  It is as powerful a modern language as you will
find.  But IMHO, learning to program in C, is like learning to hit a
fast ball from Randy Johnson.  Learn to crawl before you walk.

You have two different camps on the programming front: Procedural and
Object Oriented (OO).  And because black and white are just too
limiting, you have a billion shades of gray in between.  Languages that
incorporate pieces of both camps.

For pure OO programming, you really only have one choice in a modern
language, Ruby.  It takes OO to a purist stage, and therefore is my
choice in recommendation for learning this style of programming.  Once
you learn pure OO, you will be able to appreciate the non-pure elements
of languages like Python, Java, and C++.

For procedural programming, I generally suggest, Bash.  Yep, Bash.  It
has many of the features you need, without allowing you access to step
on other programs (bad pointer assignments, or even pointers at all).
From Bash, I like to look at (at least from a training standpoint) Perl
as a more complex version of bash.  It will fill in many of the missing
pieces.  As Keith said, if you then go on to C, C will make many of the
other languages far more clear.  C opens up all the keys to the kingdom.
But until you know enough to understand the questions, C can be
overwhelming.  I recommend learning C, but only once you understand
programming better.

Some people say, to learn a procedural language first, then learn object
orientation.  Others say learn OO, its more modern and then go on to
procedural languages like C only if you need to.  My opinion is that it
does not matter.  As a professional programmer, and Sys Admin (I work
both sides of this fence), I have different needs for different
situations.  As a professional I mix multiple languages together quite
often (right now I am working on a multi-platform [i.e. Linux, Mac, and
Windows] library, so I am using Ruby, then making it accessible to
automation on our Linux servers by writing a Bash access library on top
of that).  So, I say, just learn one, don't worry about it.

The difference between OO and procedural is organizational.  An integer
is an integer, a string is a string, but how you manipulate it may
differ.  Its more important that you get programming concepts down, than
it is to learn any one particular language.

My advice, and I have given this often... Learn Ruby.  IRB gives you an
excellent playground.  Its interpreted so you do not have to deal with
the compile/make cycle.  And you can build some useful, multi-platform
things with it.  You can extend it with a Web Application platform
(Rails), and run may of your programs on Windows and Macs, not just
Linux.  Show off your work, and get encouragement from others.  Once you
feel like you know what you are doing... Pick another language, like
Perl, or C.

The most important advice is, sorry Nike, Just Do It.

Kevin Fries



On Mon, 2011-12-19 at 09:23 -0800, keith smith wrote:
> 
> I would second starting with C.  I learned and used several languages
> before taking a C class.  C helped me understand the others.
> 

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