I Want To Learn How To Program

[Marc]

Hi guys,

 

Though this would make a good topic because its a question Im asked quite a lot, as Im sure others of you will find who can already program. The question is "How do I learn to program?". So here is a few pointers on how to get started if you want to do so, and a few questions you need to ask yourself first.

 

Questions

 

1. Have I got the time? - Sounds a daft question, but seriously ask yourself if you have the time to learn. You need to ensure that you give yourself some time each and every day to do at least some programming. The best way to learn programming is by doing.
2. Web or Desktop? - The answer to "How do I learn to program?" is different depending on whether you want to program websites or desktop applications.
3. Can I think logically? - If you know 100% that the answer to this question is no, then Im sorry to tell you that programming probably isnt for you and I dont want to waste your time in telling you that it is. 

 

 

So now we have these out of the way, we can start to answer the questions of both web and desktop programming.

 

 

WEB

 

if you want to program for the web then you need to know the basics of writing a website before you even begin to program. And the answer is yes, writing a website and programming are 2 completely different things. Writing a website is "markup" which shows a web browser what to display on a page. Nothing more, nothing less. It does not process any instructions, it does not do anything but fundimental browsing (click a link, go here, show and image, make this red etc).

 

So to start you need to learn the following:

1. HTML - HTML is the markup language which tells your browser what to display. The very page you are viewing now is made up of HTML.
2. CSS - Cascading Style Sheets are what tells the browser HOW to display the HTML. So for example show this link in blue, show this image on the left, center this paragraph etc.

 

Without the above 2 your off to a none starter. You have to have these 2 in order to do anything at all. Depending on how you like to learn here are a couple of options.

 

http://www.w3schools.com - This website has tutorials for both HTML and CSS (along with many others) which you can follow through at your leisure.

http://www.codeacademy.com - This website I would highly recommend. You follow through tutorials and actually do them live and interactively within the site.

 

After that you can learn some programming languages. Personally I started with PHP which you can also do on any of the above 2 sites. I would recommend learning a server side language such as PHP, C# , Ruby and the likes, and javascript which is a client side language used on almost every site you visit these days. Husky owners is written in PHP and contains a lot of javascript.

 

 

Desktop Programming

 

For desktop programming on the PC I would recommend C# as it will give you a good starting ground for other languages also (such as PHP mentioned above for example and Java). You will want to download visual studio express which is free from here http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/eng/downloads#d-express-windows-desktop then you will need a tutorial to follow along with. 

 

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/hh341490 is a good set of tutorials to get you started with C#, or if you would rather have a book to learn from look for one of the micrososft press books which are about the best IMO. 

 

 

 

 

 

[valkyries]

Don't know why i looked at this lol lost me straight away

[Marc]

Don't know why i looked at this lol lost me straight away

 

 

Should have added, if you get lost at the "Instructions" stage, or your name is Linda.. Id give it a miss LOL

[Andy]

That's good info and advice Marc.

Thanks.

I was learning COBOL back in the Dark ages. . . . 

Then Galileo went and pissed off the Pope and it all got shut down

[Barkers23]

i did a bit of java with my hnc and struggled.

 

every course i looked at after that had some kind of programming and put me off ha.

 

think i would try it again now being a bit older and bit more determined.

 

ive just moved teams in work from server and ops to end user computing so its all win7 and citrix stuff atm,

[Sparks]

I think number 3 is the most important...

I'm doing a range of different languages now...

Java, c#, c++, c, sql, pl/sql

And mostly Linux Shell scripting at the moment

Will be doing more pl/sql soon and then looking into 'big data'

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