What language to start?

[j3ffry]

A good day to all.

I would like to ask your opinion on what language would you suggest for me since im starting from scratch and dont know anything in programming.

And also please please recommend a good book for it or a ebook.

Thank you very much and more power!!!

[filecore]

Well that's such an incredibly broad question that I don't know where to start. It's a bit like asking which world language to learn - there are so many, and they're so different, and they're useful for different things. If you're going to South America, learn Spanish. If you're going to Asia, maybe learn Chinese. Africa? You'll get quite far with French or English. It all depends what you're aiming at.

If you're a total beginner, I would recommend a structured, logical language like BASIC as a good starting point, and investigate related languages such as Pascal (see also this). Then you can more easily branch out into C, C++, C#, Perl and others, which are basically all convoluted versions of each other.

However, you may be thinking of web design. I'd then learn the basics of HTML (and associated CSS), and then consider looking at PHP. If you want to continue with web programming in real programming languages, look into Java or Javascript, as well as ASP and related languages.

And then, somewhere between these, are database languages such as SQL and MySQL

As you can see, this is already a huge range of specialist languages which are completely different from one another. There are plenty of tutorials online for starting in these, as well as various For Dummies-type books. Can you give any more information on what you want to be able to do, and at what level?

[Ghen]

PASCAL was a good learning software for me in school, but C++ is infinitely more useful.

If you play games, try getting into the modification community for that game. Elder Scrolls and Civilization series are two that come to mind with strong communities for modding.

[j3ffry]

Thanks filecore and Ghen! Very informative reply.
Yeah it's really mind boggling where to start. I'm lost. Don't know where to start. But after reading your replies I'm seriously thinking of buying a c++ book and start from there. Maybe master it and from there, I would know (i hope) where to really concentrate.
Now what book do you usually guys start? like for dummies.
I know there are many books in the internet but i would prefer if it was coming from you guys who actually red it...

thanks!!! many thanks!!!!

[filecore]

Again, try to be specific about what you want to do with it - while learning a language "just to know it" can be educational, there's way too much out there not to have a direction. Do you want to make programs? Web apps? What sort? What point to them? The more detail you give of why you want to program, gives us more information on what direction to point you in.

[Falklian]

I'm quite partial to C#. It's very similar to C/C++ and Java. I've heard it likened to Java quite a bit by others.

There are tons of resources available online to learn C# and Microsoft also has a free IDE (Integrated Development Environment) available for use.

Visual C# Express

If you're interested in game making, then take a look at XNA.

XNA Game Studio Express

XNA is a framework that allows you to easily and quickly create games using C# (or any .NET language, like Visual Basic, Visual C++, etc. However only C# is supported in the Game Studio Express IDE)

Wikipedia entry on XNA

I originally learned to program using C++, then moved on to Java. After getting out of school, I didn't do much programming for a number of years. About 2 years ago, I wanted to get back into using C++, however it had changed quite a bit since I last used it, so I picked up a book and grabbed Microsoft's recently released (at the time) free IDE. I also took a look at C# since it was also provided free and I had always been curious about it. I ended up enjoying C# a lot more than I ever liked C++ (and I *really* liked C++) and now I exclusively code any projects in C#. It's an amazing language.

[olly]

C# or Java I would suggest. Those for dummy books are not too bad for novices.

[jeremfg]

While I've used quite some languages, I definetly recommend something like C# or Java...

They are the most user-friendly High-Level languages I know.

Plus, if you'd like to make XBOX games, C# and XNA Game Studio is a must!

[chrisadam]

I would like to ask your opinion on what language would you suggest for me since im starting from scratch and dont know anything in programming. oops

And also please please recommend a good book for it or a ebook.

[Swan2Jar]

Python was a good jump into object oriented programming for me, but I agree that C# and Java are two good languages to know nowadays.