My very first programming language was actually some kind of files that had file extensions with a b in it. It was crude and I only spent about hour working on it back in the Windows 98 days. It wasn’t till I got to college that I had my real first dose of programming. I mistakenly (or so I thought soon afterwards) took Visual Basic.NET. It was fun and I learned a lot. That learning eventually led me to learn that VB was worthless outside of Windows and only to find out that VB was slow and overly wordy (in my opinion anyway). Learning VB first did have its advantages looking back though. It taught me a lot of computer programing basics without getting overly involved in how things worked before I was ready. It was an excellent primer language.After that I eventually taught myself some C++ followed by an actual course. Quite frankly, teaching yourself C++ with no one else’s help or guidance is about as hard and as fun as sticking dull bamboo under your fingernails. I did it though, and afterwards while taking the course, I realized I had taught myself a lot more than I had thought. C++ I felt like was a good second language for me. It taught me memory management. It taught structure, flow and control. To this day C++ is still one my favorite languages I’ve learned or toyed with.
Now finally here I am teaching myself Java (to get a heads up on school) and Ruby. Ruby is awesome. I have fallen in love. With Ruby I write code quickly, efficiently, and I have fun doing it. Java, not so much. Oh well. I can defintily feel the benefits of having learned other languages before Ruby though. VB taught me how to guess what the next word or name for something was along with the basic ideas of programming. C++ taught me real programming skill and method. Between the two my amateur code is top notch for code that sucks (aka CTS not to be confused with the car).
Enjoy the Penguins!
