kicker wrote:
Hollywood_Guy wrote:
I might want to do more research into what I want to do, but for me it is hard now to think of something I do that I can code, even if I do have something I'm not thinking about. What language did you start out with or can you recommend first?
Hear me out on this.
You asked what programming language would someone else recommend. The answer is as many as it takes to achieve the goal. Very few systems run on one or even two languages. This site for example has at least five obvious languages interacting. PHP, HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and some database language most likely MySQL. There is probably also a framework it's built around but that isn't a language as much as a blueprint designed for a language.
You could take the same format and features as this site and build it with Asp, Java, Python, etc. Each having their advantages and disadvantages (read level of difficulty) to achieving the desired results. As well as different associated costs for each variation.
I would suggest starting with HTML, and working up/down from there. Html is forgiving, easy to understand and will give you a sense of how things interact. It's also a little more immediate as far as return on investment. With HTML5 you can even do animation that was for a long time restricted to scripting languages. HTML is a tag based language. Making it easy to read, an example would be:
<html>
<head>
<title>My first attempt</title>
</head>
<!---everything the user sees is in between the body tags on a web page in most instances.--->
<body>Hello world.</body>
</html>
You could copy that right now, open a text editor, paste it, save the file as an .htm or .html file and then use your browser to open it no server required. Hopefully you can see why that it's a good starting point for any beginner. No fancy software required to write it, easy to read, easy to understand, etc. If you think that you can just jump right into a scripting language...well good luck with that as most people who do end up giving up when they realize how difficult it is without an understanding of how things interact on basic levels. Html gives you an opportunity to build your skills to a point where jumping into a scripting language will be easier and be organic rather than forced.
Just my opinion.
Seconded. You should absolutely learn HTML and CSS before anything else. PHP is incredibly complex and I still don't quite understand it myself. Imagine computer programming as a tower of sorts, with no visible stairs or elevatoes. In theory, you could climb up a window shaft to the next floor (HTML to Java, for instance) but you would have no earthly idea where you were or what exactly is going on in that particular domain. However, if you have the necessary building blocks, you can construct your own stairs, and feel prepared to take on unforeseen challenges.
HTML is good programming practice, as it gets you used to formatting basic code and allows you to alter a lot of different aspects of a webpage locally, without ever having to connect to a server to see your page. After you've mastered HTML, CSS will be your aesthetic arsenal, and is an essential tool in making good, user friendly webpages. HTML and CSS are bread and butter, they go hand in hand. Learning how to make stylish webpages without nabbing a template is incredibly useful.
From there, you should try to learn JavaScript, or Python. But JS is used in an insane amount of webpages.
19 Feb 2018, 6:59 pm
