a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by Dendrophobe
Dendrophobe  ·  3619 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Need advice on learning a programming language

    My biggest piece of advice is just go do it. Just fucking do it. Don't get wrapped up in researching the differences between languages. Skip sections of the tutorial if they bore you. Figure out what you want something to do and then figure out how to build it and make it happen.

100% agree. This applies to most things in life, too*. If you want to start doing something new, you have to do it. Time spent researching is time not spent practicing, and at an early stage, the gains you'll get from practice are much greater than the gains you'll get from picking the right tools**. Besides, making mistakes teaches you a lot, especially in the early days.

    Figure out what you want something to do and then figure out how to build it and make it happen.

Quoted again, because this is essential. If you don't have something to use it for, you won't be successful at learning a programming language. I first learned to program when I was 16. I didn't do any more until I was 20, and I'd forgotten all of it***. I've probably used 10 different languages at one time or another. I'm only fluent with two right now, because those are the ones I'm actively using. I keep thinking "Hey, it'd be cool to learn Julia", read a couple tutorials and then forget everything I've learned because I haven't got anything to use it for. Programming's an active skill, and if you don't use it, you lose it.

*Not open heart surgery.

**Speaking of which, @JethroTulli, have you picked a text editor yet? Don't spend too much time thinking about it, just get one and really learn it. If you're on windows, Notepad is pretty basic, but it's easy and will work for a beginner. When you want something more advanced, give Atom a try, or Eclipse if you want heavy-duty features.

***I'm sure some of the principles stayed with me, but the language itself (Perl) was gone completely from my memory.