Picking a First Language to Learn to Program
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Learning Python Resources
Online:
Code Academy on Python
Learn Python
Python: Getting Started
Google's Python CourseBooks:
Head First Python
Python for Kids
Python Crash Course
Learning Python -
How many people choose a language to start? I learnt Sinclair BASIC first because my parents bought a Sinclair computer. I then learnt Cobol because that is what I was taught at school. I then learnt dBase because that was what I was told to use in my first job. I then learnt Clipper because that was my second job. And so on. I've never really chosen what to learn.
Are things are different for kids today?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
How many people choose a language to start?
Enough that I get asked about once a fortnight.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
Are things are different for kids today?
Very different. Kids don't get taught to program anymore. I know of exactly zero in the US that get taught that. When I was a kid, everyone was taught to program. Now, no one is. My niece is even in the advanced STEM program at a huge high school with over 10K students, is near the top of her class, has expressed an interest in programming, has been on the robotics team for years and... maybe someday will get a cursory introduction to C#, maybe. So far, there is no hint of that coming.
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I learned BASIC on DOS 1 because it was what we had access to. But by the time I was twelve or thirteen I was learning C because I chose it. That was in the 1980s. My very first language I had little choice, but that did not last long. I did learn Fortran because it was what we had to use at college, along with C which I already knew, but after BASIC and Fortran, all of my languages were by choice.
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Today, people are computer users. When we were kids in the 80's the only way to use a computer for most things was to know at least a bit of basic programming.
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Kids today don't learn about computers, they learn to use applications.
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That's poor. My lad will be getting a free Raspberry-Pi like computer when he starts secondary school next year. Every kid in the country gets one when they're 11.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
That's poor. My lad will be getting a free Raspberry-Pi like computer when he starts secondary school next year. Every kid in the country gets one when they're 11.
The US doesn't make anything cool like that to hand out
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I personally hate Python because of whitespace indentation being the ONLY means of structuring logic.
Yes all good code is typically indented and such for readability even when it does not have to be. But making this the only way to have a loop or if statement work just kills me. -
@scottalanmiller said:
- Python is heavily used in both software engineering as well as IT so it is very flexible as a career building language.
#truth - This was a big deal for Google when I was going for a Windows Sys Admin position with them.
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Every major coding interview I've done in the past decade has either requested or accepted Python for code.
