[NTLUG:Discuss] Programming

[brian@pongonova.net]

Patrick--

My recommendation is to pick an area that interests you, and learn the
language that's appropriate for the area of interest.  Intrigued by
the kernel?  You'll need C to hack on it.  Interested in writing
widgets/apps for a desktop?  Probably C++ is your best bet here.  Have
some sysadmin tasks you want to automate?  Shell scripting and Perl
would be very useful.  Want to create a GUI-based user application
that isn't system dependent?  Perl, Tcl/Tk, and Python are all good
candidates to start with.

The idea here is that the best language to learn is the one you're
most interested in learning...and that's usually the one that (1) pays
your bills, or (2) allows you to do something fun.  Me telling you
that I recommend language "X" doesn't mean you'll derive the same amount
of satisfaction (or income) from it that I do.

You'll find that once you learn the basic programming tenets
(sequence, selection, iteration), all progamming languages become
easier to pick up.  Your experience with Javascript has probably
already made your learning curve a little less steep. 

So pick something that looks fun and go for it!

  --Brian

On Mon, Mar 25, 2002 at 02:48:31PM -0600, Patrick Parks wrote:
> I want to learn a language for linux, and dont know where to start. I am
> experienced with HTML and Javascript. Any suggestions?