free programming language

[Gregory Nowak]

I have had no problem moving from basic to c++. As a matter of fact, I feel that my knowledge of basic before c++ hellped me ultimately rather then hindering me.
Greg


On Tue, Mar 12, 2002 at 06:57:37AM -0500, Brian Borowski wrote:
> I agree with Jim.  Many of the basic programmers I know, have never been
> able to move on comfortably even to C, and have often therefore, remained
> with basic, and all the bad ideas that it brings along, besides, most
> implementations of that language aren't free, anyway, so why bother if
> there are so many other good free implementations of better languages out
> there.
> 
> You really need good documentation like a book, or some of the excellent
> documentation that accompanies some of the free distributions of
> programming languages.
> 
> You could start with java, if your into object oriented languages, and want
> to structure your life that way, and get the book Exploring Java, from
> O'rielly; java is available for Windows as well as all the better Os's.
> 
> You could just learn C, Cygnus for Win or the wonderful gnu stuff for
> linux, and get a good book; check out empowermentzone.
> 
> You could get perl, there is ActiveState's perl for Win, and of course the
> default stuff that comes with linux; and the book Learning Perl from
> O'reilly, or again, empowermentzone has a few.
> 
> There's so much choice, but the real thing is, you've got to have some
> commitment and initiative to see the thing through; this is really the
> important part of the whole thing.
> 
> In my opinion, C is the ultimate, I like perl and java, (java when I need
> to), but as someone else has said, the technique, not the language is
> important.  The skills like algorithm design and its implementation are
> what you really have to learn, then you use the language to express your
> ideas in something the machine can understand and work with.
> 
> Brian Borowski
> 
> 
> On Mon, 11 Mar 2002 jwantz at hpcc2.hpcc.noaa.gov wrote:
> 
> > Hi Greg,
> > I definitely disagree.  BASIC teaches bad programming habits like
> > FORTRAN i.e. non-structured programming.  The problem with C is not the
> > language, but that most people learning C start by reading Kernighan and
> > Richie.  I have been programming in C since 1986 but it took me almost
> > half of that time to unlearn bad habits I picked up from BASIC and
> > FORTRAN.  Now, one could make a case for Pascal as your first language
> > but I really think BASIC is a bad idea.  Sure, you might be able to
> > accomplish certain tasks easier in BASIC than in C, but the time you
> > spend in learning C will make you a much better programmer in the long
> > run.
> >      Jim Wantz
> > On Sun, 10 Mar 2002, Gregory Nowak wrote:
> >
> > > Since we're on opinions, in my opinion c or c++ are not good languages to begin with. I believe from personal experience that it is best to start with something like basic, and then move on to languages like c or c++ where the concepts you learned from BASIC will help you advance in higher languages faster.
> > > Greg
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sun, Mar 10, 2002 at 06:48:35PM -0500, jwantz at hpcc2.hpcc.noaa.gov wrote:
> > > > Hi Alex,
> > > > While BASIC sounds like a good starting language in my opinion it is
> > > > not.  First, it is very non-standard (no two BASIC interpreters or
> > > > compilers are alike).  Second, file i/o in most BASICs is really rather
> > > > painful.  As far as I know, the only BASIC widely used in WINDOWS is
> > > > Visual BASIC which is hardly free!
> > > >
> > > >      Jim Wantz
> > > > n Sun, 10 Mar 2002, Alex Snow wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > I would use, and want to learn, basic, if there was a free Compiler and/or
> > > > > IDE for basic under winblows.
> > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > From: "Gregory Nowak" <gnowak1 at uic.edu>
> > > > > To: <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
> > > > > Sent: Sunday, March 10, 2002 2:56 PM
> > > > > Subject: Re: free programming language
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > > How about BASIC?
> > > > > > Greg
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > On Sun, Mar 10, 2002 at 01:25:38PM -0500, Alex Snow wrote:
> > > > > > > Hi.
> > > > > > > I am looking for a programming language for windows that is both free
> > > > > and easy to learn for a beginning programmer.  Does such a language exist?
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > ---
> > > > > >
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