Programming Languages

[hewligan]

Okay, so I just got curious (because it's cold outside and I have nothing better to do than think about this stuff) - lots of people around here know PHP and Javascript, but I was wondering what other programming languages you've used.

Me? I started with BASIC in school, learnt Pascal when I started university, then C, Fortran and Shell Scripting because, well, I was doing physics and needed that stuff, then Perl - because no one had heard of PHP yet, and later PHP.

I'm not sure I so much learnt Javascript as picked up enough to fake it :D

[Drazan]

Started with basic, dabbled with C, know enough to work with Perl, javascript, asp, php, and now getting into flash action script.

[tZ]

I'm currently learning java hoping to get into c++ afterwards.

The stuff I'm pretty familiar with: (xml, xslt, css, xhtml, javascript, php, sql)

Its been a while since I've looked at actionscipt so I wouldn't really include that but, in the past I have worked in that- - back when it was just actionscript.

hewligan wrote:

I'm not sure I so much learnt Javascript as picked up enough to fake it


Once you know one OOP language they are all basically the same. People say javascript and java are very different yet they are just the opposite.

[resdog]

started with actionscript and LINGO (Macromedia Director), then expanded to javascript and am now learning (or trying to learn) php and perl, as well as coldFusion.

[hewligan]

Once you know one OOP language they are all basically the same. People say javascript and java are very different yet they are just the opposite.

Well, they're both C++ derived OOP languages, so there are a lot of similarities, but Java is strongly typed and javascript isn't, which actually makes a big difference once you get into them.

[frankster]

C reasonably well, a bit of C++, Basic and Fortran, all because of the physics. Not used it much at all since. A dinky bit of php nowerdays, but used it more about 4 or 5 years ago. I'd like to learn more, the husband is a perl and Java wizard, but at the end of the day my brain feels like it's been soaking in stupid and all I want to do it paint/draw/drink/sleep.

[hewligan]

C reasonably well, a bit of C++, Basic and Fortran, all because of the physics. Not used it much at all since. A dinky bit of php nowerdays, but used it more about 4 or 5 years ago. I'd like to learn more, the husband is a perl and Java wizard, but at the end of the day my brain feels like it's been soaking in stupid and all I want to do it paint/draw/drink/sleep.

I'd like to avoid the programming and focus more on the drawing and drinking part, but I keep getting into these situations where no one else knows how, so it's like, fine, I'll do it.

[tZ]

hewligan wrote:

Well, they're both C++ derived OOP languages, so there are a lot of similarities, but Java is strongly typed and javascript isn't, which actually makes a big difference once you get into them.


Besides for that aspect they very simular. Yeah… it is a little weird afrer working with javascript for so long to include the type of variable in the declaration but, I don't think that is enough to say they aren't simular.

[hewligan]

hewligan wrote:


Besides for that aspect they very simular. Yeah… it is a little weird afrer working with javascript for so long to include the type of variable in the declaration but, I don't think that is enough to say they aren't simular.

It really depends on how you look at it.

From a programming language theory point of view, the two of them are very different.

For someone actually using the two languages, they're probably not so different.

Also, the two languages are a lot more similar now - as Javascript has picked up Java-like features over the years - than they were when they were first introduced.

[urstwile]

I dabbled a little bit, a long time ago, but it's been many years. I played with Basic and C++. Didn't really have any need to use it back then, though, so I got tired of it. I remember I thought it was kind of fun.

For someone interested in maybe picking it up again, what would you peeps recommend as a good place to start (something with real world practical applications)?

[hewligan]

For someone interested in maybe picking it up again, what would you peeps recommend as a good place to start (something with real world practical applications)?

PHP is amazingly easy to learn, and judging by the number of websites running on it, has a lot of real-world applications. Of course, it's really only used for websites, so if you're not interested in that...

Python is another easy to pick up language, and is more general purpose than PHP (though there is web stuff built on that, too, but lots of other stuff besides).

[urstwile]

Good to know, Hewligan, thanks. (furtive lick at Hewligan's brain again). :D

[hewligan]

Oh, and another thought if you're looking for real-world applications - Apple Script is a good way to build new Automator Actions, which can often be handy, and is really easy to use.

[urstwile]

Yup, forgot about that, I've actually dabbled in those a bit as well, I've been meaning to get more into it.

Years ago, I actually built an application using Macromedia Director's scripting capabilities, does that count. :)

[hewligan]

Yup, Lingo is a programming language.

Actually, it's sometimes a bit odd what counts and what doesn't. For example, a lot of people refer to writing HTML as programming, but HTML, CSS and XML aren't programming lanuages (HTML and XML are markup languages, and CSS is a stylesheet langauage). On the other hand, XSL arguably is a programming language (it's Turing Complete (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_complete) - and while something that isn't Turing Complete may or may not be a programming language, something that is Turing Complete almost always is).

As another example, Postscript is actually a programming language (again, it's Turing Complete), but PDF isn't (despite being based on Postscript).

[jasonchan]

PHP is amazingly easy to learn, and judging by the number of websites running on it, has a lot of real-world applications. Of course, it's really only used for websites, so if you're not interested in that...

Python is another easy to pick up language, and is more general purpose than PHP (though there is web stuff built on that, too, but lots of other stuff besides).
PHP is easy??? I bought a book recently to learn and i am still kinda lost.
Seems like everyone has learned Basic, C++, Perl, etc.

So far, all i know is XHTML and CSS, and it is difficult enough with all these different web browser compatibility issues. What should i really focus next? should i learn Basic, C++, Perl, and then dive into PHP, Actionscript, and javascript???

Need some advice guys

[hewligan]

PHP is easy??? I bought a book recently to learn and i am still kinda lost.
Seems like everyone has learned Basic, C++, Perl, etc.

So far, all i know is XHTML and CSS, and it is difficult enough with all these different web browser compatibility issues. What should learn next? should i learn Basic, C++, Perl, and then dive into PHP, Actionscript, and javascript???

Need some advice guys

Honestly, the first programming language is always hard, no matter what you pick - and after that they get much easier.

PHP really is one of the easiest to learn. C++ and Perl are both well out at the hard end of the spectrum. BASIC is pretty easy, but these days it's also fairly pointless to learn.

You could give Actionscript or Javascript (they're both technically the same language) a go, as they're certainly not hard, but to be honest I'd stick with PHP.

And I've always found the main PHP documentation (http://www.php.net/manual/en/) pretty easy to follow - give it a go - but I have been programming computers since I was about six ;)

[urstwile]

Yup, Lingo is a programming language.

Actually, it's sometimes a bit odd what counts and what doesn't. For example, a lot of people refer to writing HTML as programming, but HTML, CSS and XML aren't programming lanuages (HTML and XML are markup languages, and CSS is a stylesheet langauage). On the other hand, XSL arguably is a programming language (it's Turing Complete (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_complete) - and while something that isn't Turing Complete may or may not be a programming language, something that is Turing Complete almost always is).

As another example, Postscript is actually a programming language (again, it's Turing Complete), but PDF isn't (despite being based on Postscript).
Interesting. The funny thing is that even though I just don't have much practical application for learning programming languages, I actually really enjoyed dabbling in them. My head wraps around them quite comfortably, but I lose interest when I have no use beyond just the abstract learning thing (something that's true for everything with me, just my nature, I guess).

When Postscript was still but a twinkle in most people's eyes, I was learning some of the basics about it. It was a monster trying to get it figured out with our front end (pre-Mac/WYSIWYG days) computers, but I felt quite triumphant the day I got something to position itself sideways (rotated) off of our coding based typesetting system, using pure Postscript code.

Good times, people, good times. :D

And for the record, I've never viewed HTML and XML as programming languages. They're markup languages, something I completely understand from my early typesetting days in the mid-70s. When you would get a paragraph of 10/12 Caslon No. 3, it would look like this:

<cp10/12x45,cn3>

But there was no option for variables, or conditionals or stuff like that (if I'm remembering the terminology correctly). Style sheets were called formats.

[hewligan]

And for the record, I've never viewed HTML and XML as programming languages. They're markup languages, something I completely understand from my early typesetting days in the mid-70s.

Oh, I didn't mean you - or anyone in particular, I just remember hearing a few people in different places refer to HTML as programming recently.

And I've actually looked at a bunch of languages over the years that I didn't really learn because I just had no particular use for them, so once the curiosity ran out...

That early typesetting stuff must have been pretty exciting, though.

[frailer]

Throw a bit more of the PostScript/PDF thing, Hewligan. My PDF7 Bible hints that PS is one long string of code, whereas PDF is more a database file. F'rinstance, Postscript will contain the code for a font in a repeated/serial fashion, as required. PDF will access the font, as required, from a database, each time it is needed. i.e it's accessing an embedded font database file.
Is this, crudely speaking, true? Would love to have any insights on this, or other differences between the 2. Having background info like this sometimes helps in unexpected ways when troubleshooting.
On the other hand, with Print Engine, we won't need to be concerned with PS, right?

[frankster]

Speakin of Turing... Have you ever looked into the guys life? He worked on cracking the Enigma code at bletchley park during the 2nd world war, then came to Manchester (where I studied) and worked on some of the first stored program computers (the Manchester mark one). Poor bloke admitted to having a homosexual relationship and got threatened with prison if he didn't undergo "hormone therapy" in the 50's and killed himself by eating an apple that he'd injected with cyanide in 1954! I find it so awful that stupid predjudices in the 50's basically robbed computing of one probably it's greatest mind. The guy was a genius, who knows what he would have come up with if he lived to see the invention of the transistor!

[hewligan]

Yeah, I read Simon Singh's "The Code Book," which has a lot of stuff about Turing's life. It was a real tragedy. Stupid prejudice cost us one of the great minds of the 20th Century.

[JPnyc]

The biggest difference is that languages like Java and C++ are OOLs, meaning they have an API and a full massive range of packages and classes already in existence. You can create classes in javascript, but there isn't this massive existing library of them.

Beyond that is the issue of strongly vs. loosely typed languages. Syntactically speaking, Javascript lets you get away with murder, Java executes you for jaywalking.

[tZ]

JPync wrote:


Javascript lets you get away with murder, Java executes you for jaywalking.


nice

jasonchan wrote:


So far, all i know is XHTML and CSS, and it is difficult enough with all these different web browser compatibility issues. What should i really focus next? should i learn Basic, C++, Perl, and then dive into PHP, Actionscript, and javascript???


After I got the grasp of CSS a XHTML I went to javascript. I think php is tad more difficult to understand then javascript but, thats my personal prefrence.

[JPnyc]

Absolutely, JavaScript is a terrific way to be introduced to procedural languages. So is Visual Basic, for that matter. It doesn't get any easier than those two.

[hewligan]

Javascript's certainly not hard, but personally, I find PHP much easier. JS kinda annoys me.

Then again, where I work, I'm surrounded by Java programmers, who go sort of cross-eyed when you show them PHP. It's largely a matter of taste.

[JPnyc]

It's all personal taste, and experience. What you know the best is the easiest. I feel the same way about PHP as they do. Probably because I studied Java like they did.

[jessicam]

I started with TI Basic and later learned some C, C++, Java, Javascript, PHP, HTML, CSS, and ActionScript. Right now I am most comfortable with Actionscript and probably couldn't be effective without a lot of refresher in anything else but HTML and CSS.

I learned Basic when I was 11ish. I was just fooling around with it, and I don't think there is any better way in the world to start programming. If you are just playing it's not intimidating, it's not scary, there's no pressure. Just a desire to learn more so you can have more fun playing.

[balou]

Back in the day... Programming is what I studied right after high school. I loved computers and loved art but the two were'nt comingled yet so I chose programming. It's been a couple decades since I've done any programming but I have a good skeleton for it if I decide to give it a go. Cobol, RPG and Assembly were my beginnings...way back when I walked to the computer lab in 4 feet of snow...uphill....both ways...

[Mynock]

Back in the day... Programming is what I studied right after high school. I loved computers and loved art but the two were'nt comingled yet so I chose programming. It's been a couple decades since I've done any programming but I have a good skeleton for it if I decide to give it a go. Cobol, RPG and Assembly were my beginnings...way back when I walked to the computer lab in 4 feet of snow...uphill....both ways...Spin some yarn about vacuum tubes pleeeeease :) or punch cards.

[pinoy_boy]

I am more of a designer than a developer. So I only know HTML, and a little CSS, and JavaScript.