Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

[TheNoSoMan]

For those who have learned and used certain programming languages such as C++, Java, or Perl, try to give your opinions on them and if you would recommend them to newcomers. Just curious to know.

[d4u7211]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

Haven't used Perl, but i dont hear of it being super powerful for much

I coded in Java for 2 years and, honestly, I like it. For a while I hated it because i always felt like there were too many finicky rules following it, and that the language was demanding in the sense that so much had to be imported/written physically to achieve a goal. Then I moved onto C++ and realized how demanding IT is, as well as some of the obscurity i feel like that comes with it. Java does stupid things sometimes, and the power behind it is limited once you get into certain areas imo.

C++, while obscure and, to me harder to learn than Java, i am realizing is quicker to write and is a little more versatile and powerful than Java is. I've just recently been using it for a couple of months.

I would recommend either of them to a newcomer, most likely i would start with Java, because I feel like it is more "english" oriented and it is easier to take in than C++.

[customstuff]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

I haven't really coded in any of the languages you mentioned, especially since I'm still in my first year of my course. However, we did Visual Basic programming for the first semester and it was easy to follow and somewhat more "english" than other languages. Right now we're just starting C# and it seems sorta complicated but it may be more useful once I get used to it. C++ is next year so I will see how that goes, haha

[FissionMailed1]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

Visual Basic (puke)

[dAnceguy117]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

I'm a relative newcomer to programming. Others here could probably give you more insight. Still, I'll try to share my experiences.


C - somewhat tough for beginners. There are a lot of fine details which must be understood, like manual memory allocation and pointers to specific memory addresses. The syntax is clean and intuitive, though, so several other languages have built on this foundation. Powerful in the sense that programmers have precise control.

Java - much nicer for beginners than C. There's still a lot of gobbledygook for absolute beginners to wade though, though; the syntax isn't even close to "plain English" in my opinion. The API has a ton of useful methods, classes, etc. For me, Java worked nicely as an introduction to object-oriented programming.

Python - has the simplest-looking code of any language I've used. Excellent for beginners. Plenty of useful functions and such. I only have a vague impression, though, as I've only ever written a handful of programs in Python.

PHP - results in pretty simple code. Awesome for database interactivity. You can really easily code up dynamic web pages, which can be much more meaningful to an aspiring newcomer than seeing terminal/command prompt/whatever spit out some output. PHP sort of "allows" a lot of common programming mistakes, though, and might enable new programmers to fall into some bad habits.

Assembly language - lmfao. Incredibly technical, hardware-specific, essential for some purposes, scary as hell.


I look forward to reading others' responses. I'd like to experiment with more languages once I get the chance :)

[Choofers]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

I don't understand what the hate on basic is about but apparently I'm bad for trying to teach myself basic??? ?_?

[infinity.]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

I don't understand what the hate on basic is about but apparently I'm bad for trying to teach myself basic??? ?_?

i started with basic. it's a pretty easy language and it's nice for beginners because they get a furnished gui

python is probably the most intuitive language i've worked with.

java seems a lot more capable but is annoying syntactically

[fido123]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

Not that this discussion isn't a bad one to have, but I feel a lot of people get hung up on what tools to use, rather than how they're using them. For example, IMO PHP is a pretty shit language compared to Ruby/Python/Perl which are fairly relateable languages (at least when we're talking about PHP). However, I code in PHP almost every single day of the week for work, and it doesn't really matter an awful lot because it's a tool I know how to use well. If it works, it works and if you can make it work faster in PHP than you can with Ruby on Rails then why the hell shouldn't you be doing that?


Now that I'm over that:

(Visual) Basic - Honestly, even after saying all I just said, this language should be dead. Sure, it's easy to create a simple GUI with it but that's just the .NET framework. You can do that with much more powerful and updated languages such as C# or even C++.

Java - Really cool and powerful because it runs on the JVM which allows for code you write in a Windows environment, to also run on GNU/Linux and OS X. It's also pretty fast. Personally, hate coding for it though. It's pretty verbose in all the ways I don't want it to be.

C - Usually too low level for what most people need but is good for exploring how a computer really works a bit better. Usually used when building something requiring high performance.

Python - My favorite compared to Ruby and Perl. Really nice for a lot of general use programming.

JavaScript/Web Platform - Although this sounds a bit crazy, it's getting more and more popular as things are moving more towards web based applications and away from one's that are stored locally. Examples of this include GoogleDocs/Gmail/Microsoft Office 360. I also really enjoy developing for it when using something like jQuery or Dojo. Node.js is a pretty cool new technology for server side JS, and with that paired to something like this, could create some pretty cool web apps.

[ninjaKIWI]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

I don't understand what the hate on basic is about but apparently I'm bad for trying to teach myself basic??? ?_?

Basic should be dead. I'm not sure why anyone uses it. My high school courses were all basic, pretty much a waste of three courses.

EDIT: pretty much exactly what fido said everywhere.

[dAnceguy117]

Re: Your Opinion On Some Programming Languages

great post fido, thanks for the insight!