Learning Programming (C/C++)

[JonnyFoxtrot]

Properly, properly nerdy I know but is it possible to learn the above during my spare time? And more so, is it worth it?

I've started getting a bit into Linux (only GUI based stuff to be fair) recently and am also quite clued up on what goes on in the Android phone community (XDA etc) however I want to actually start to get involved and therefore want to learn a programming language. As I understand it, nearly everything nowadays is written in, based on or has some part of C/C++ used.

I'm pretty much a complete noob when it comes to programming or code based environments other than the odd DOS command prompt work I sometimes do at my job or the couple of years of Computing I did at college (long forgotten) where we dabbled with VB. Is it something I could feasibly learn using online free tutorials in my spare time, i.e the couple of hours before falling asleep where the gf is dozing off and I'm on the lappy in bed?

I'm not planning on pursuing a career in it, but it would be nice to understand some of the work serious devs or forum users put into the work I see on various linux distros or xda custom roms. Hell, it would even be nice to contribute if I was to be any good at it.

Worth pursuing? Or shall I just walk away now? Should I consider something else to start with? Go back to VB or Java maybe?

Ta
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[nowhere.elysium]

I have, thus far.

Having an actual project makes it easier.

See my digital dash thread for more details.
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[daemonoid]

The android sdk (Software Development Kit) is for java. So either start there or if you are totally new take a look at:

https://code.google.com/p/android-scripting/

Then use Python. Python is a very good language for beginners, it teaches the basics and is highly structured which enforces good programming practices that will benefit you in the long run. One tip before you start in Python though is there's a big difference between a tab and a bunch of spaces!

<edit> C++ is beginning to go out of fashion, it will be used for the foreseeable future, but other languages are beginning to replace it. The main reason is that the development cycle becomes cheaper with higher level languages. A simple switch from C++ to C# means much less time spent managing memory (and I've seen memory issues add months to projects). C is pretty much gone... I've not actually heard of anyone starting a (decent sized) project in C in the past 10 years. C tends to be used only on legacy systems.
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[nowhere.elysium]

Yeah - most structured languages will have you looking suspiciously at any whitespace before too long

Of course, if you're like me, then you'll find Perl nice to work with. No structure at all, and you can even turn what little self-regulation there is off at the beginning of the program.

It's kind like programming on post-its. You get very used to terse, incomprehensible statements, which you'll never be able to pick apart again.
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[daemonoid]

[Rogerborg]

Pick an open source project that interests you and which has simple, crystal clear instructions on how to download and build it on your development platform.

Do that. In a couple of days when you realise that the instructions are several versions out of date, and never really worked anyway, switch to another project.

Rinse and repeat until you find something that you can actually build and run yourself.

Choose one thing to change, even if it's just the colour on a menu.

Recompile and see the results of your change.

Toss a celebratory one off the wrist - you've just taken your first step into a larger universe.
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[nowhere.elysium]

If you want to play with something that feels like a proper language, and doesn't require three sides of A4 just to render something GUI-flavoured, try playing around with Processing.
C++-style syntax, prebuilt graphical functions, masses of support, and it's a really nice and simple sandbox environment to play around in.
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[el_oso]

starting programming is i would say, completely pointless unless you have a goal at the end of it.
there are so many languages out there and then so many libraries that all have particular uses, that you can't possibly learn all of them.
that being said, once you have an understanding of how a computer 'thinks' then learning new languages and using new libraries is relatively straight forward.
pretty much all the books introducing languages will all teach you the same/very similar things. i.e loops, conditional statements, basic input/output and some sort of function.
from a beginners perspective setting up a c/c++ compiler on a windows machine and getting everything ready to begin programming is the hardest part. it will seem like a huge amount of time used/wasted before you can actually see a result. (depending on what route you go)
setting up java is much simpler. it's pretty much download netbeans/eclipse and away you go. java has a similar style to c++ so going from one to the other wouldn't take much work. for that reason i would start with java. once you have the programming basics down, you can start specializing in a certain area. android apps are written in java, so all you have to do is download development tools for android and you can start building apps right away. if you want to do more GUI stuff then this would probably be a good route to go. if you want to do more hardcore programming (the backend stuff, that nobody sees and end users don't really care about how works as long as they get the result they wanted out of it) then maybe switching to C/C++ would be a good idea.

tl;dr - have an idea what you want to get out of learning to program. writing programs for android and writing programs for windows/linux can be very different.
java is a good place to start. lots of built in stuff which will let you try different aspects of programming from the front end GUI stuff as well as the gritty back-end stuff
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[Andy_Pagin]

Best learn to walk before you try to run, this site has a decent tutorial and a useful reference to the C/C++ libraries.

https://www.cplusplus.com/

On Linux you'll need gcc and g++ compilers and a IDE, I use Code::Blocks https://www.codeblocks.org/. Getting it all set up is a bit of a headache, but it works well.
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[daemonoid]

To those worried about how hard it is to set up an environment on windows, just download and install visual studio express - https://www.microsoft.com/express

I'd reiterate that C++ is not where a beginner should start. C# is ok, but as the OP wants to work on android java or one of the scripting languages is the only way to go.
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[Frost]

Some programming languages you tell it what you want to do and it pretty much does it. The trick it learning how to tell it what you want. Generally scripting languages like Python, PHP, Javascript are easier to learn and don't punish you so hard for your mistakes.
'Proper' languages require compiling which can be a pain. Java and C# are alright and fairly safe and helpful to use.
C & C++ are total bastards. Simpley getting the syntax right for the command to compile your files can be a banging your head off a wall experience. Everything must be specified EXACTLY or it will fail massively. C++ you have to deal directly with pointers (memory addresses) and do things like pointer arithmetic. Fuck that up and your program won't tell you why it crashed, it might not even crash it might keep on running overwriting bits of memory that don't belong to it causing OTHER programs to crash!

I can code C++ pretty well and i consider it to be more hassle than it's worth, as does the rest of the world. The fact that everything must be explicitly specified used to be great for making code run faster... But these days compilers have got better and do many optimisations for you. So the high cost of development and making changes to programs written in such a fussy unreadable language with such a steep learning curve are seeing it fall out of favour.

Learn Java. You can do websites in it, desktop applications and android apps.

[Bomberman]

I'm not sure how basic your knowledge is, but this https://www.codecademy.com/#!/exercises/0 is actually quite good if you're starting out.
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[Codemonkey]

[daemonoid]

[JonnyFoxtrot]

Thanks all for the replies, top notch as always

Think I'm going to give Python a go as a few on here and elsewhere have recommended and then possibly step into the realms of Java once I'm confident with Python. Cheers!!
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[Frost]

If you've done programming before i suggest you learn about Object orientation.
If you're new to programming forget about OO for now. Learn functions, passing stuff in at command line, reading files, printing stuff out, arrays etc. Avoid anything that contains the following words:
Class
Interface
Extends
Implements

As that's all OO stuff and you'll just get confused trying to learn too much at once.

There is a cool library called Numpy that lets you easily do maths, print out graphs and tables and stuff. It's fun to play about with once you've figured out the basics and can be useful for uni work and stuff.

[Rogerborg]

[supZ]

if you want to learn a language id recommend C#/.net

its 'the thing to do' these days

if you hate bill gates and all microsoft related products you can give php a go if you wish (v5+ for OO)

C#.net will set you up for any little projects you want to do. be they windows programs to websites. its a modern language as well so plenty of support and info out there.

to answer your question though.. yes its reasonable to learn it yourself. when i first got into coding i learnt classic asp/php/javascript/sql etc.. on my own. years later i've developed 100s of programs/sites/apps in those languages.

most of my current job is still classic asp working on legacy applications but im currently doing a .net (C#) project that'll turn into the updated version of these apps.

i have done visual studio 2010 and c# courses paid for by work so i cant really say thats self taught although i did write an ajax powered chat program before as a play around heh.

a good idea is to think of something you'd like to do. an app/website or something and start learning with that in mind. if you have a clear idea of what you want to do you'll be more inclined to stick at it than just with fiddling about doing examples.
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[LordShaftesbu...]

I learning by working through one of those O'Reilly "Learning the ..." books, just read each chapter and do the exercises at the end and hey presto you can code. A bit.

[el_oso]

[_Chris_]

It really depends on what you hope to be able to do.

1 - Programming Applications - e.g. a simple calculator
2 - Scripting - automating a series of tasks

Either way, the most important thing to learn is logical structures. Once you decide what you want to achieve, write it out like a recipe (it's called pseudocode), then you can use that base for whichever programming/scripting language you like.

e.g, For me, I have to automate tasks against many remote PCs. So to put a file on each PC, the pseudocode may look like:

1 - Define a list of target PCs I want to interact with
2 - Check each one is online (no point trying to send a file to a switched off box)
3 - Perform the action on the online workstation - send the file

That's a pretty typical job, I'd add some logging in there so I have a record of what PCs were successful.

Personally I use powershell for these things as it's quick and easy, code would be something like:

1 - Define a list of target PCs I want to interact with
$targetPCs = get-content c:\workstations.txt
2 - Check each one is online (no point trying to send a file to a switched off box)
foreach ($entry in $targetPCs)
{$onlinecheck = test-connection $entry -count 1 -quiet
3 - Perform the action on the online workstation - send the file
if($onlinecheck){copy-item c:\requiredfile.txt \\$entry\c$}
}

Regardless of what you want language you want to learn, if you can't break down a problem into its component parts then you'll really struggle. Try writing pseudocode for typical math formulas - Pythagoras' Theory is an easy one to start with. Once you have the list of steps that need to happen, you can 'translate' them into a language - most people know more than one language and use the one most suitable to the task at hand. For example if I have to distribute something to a user, I can't use powershell as they don't have it installed, so I'll have to use VisualBasicScript or similar.

Basically, yes, you can teach yourself, you just need to know what your goal is.
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[LordShaftesbu...]

[Rogerborg]

[tbourner]

[bazza]