website development seems like the only thing I would want to do so Ruby it is! Unfortunately, it isn't on my Ubuntuu install. When I tried to start it it told me to apt-get it. No internet connection. On Sat, Feb 20, 2010 at 7:12 PM, Joseph Sinclair wrote: > Let's not devolve into a favorite language war. There are situations where > Python is a great language choice, and situations where it's terrible. > Every language choice comes down to what you want to accomplish. > Some languages are good for rapid development of websites (Ruby, PHP, > etc...). > Some languages are good for systems management scripts (Python, Perl, > etc...). > Some languages are good for developing large web systems intended to be > maintained for years (Java, others). > Some languages are good for developing packaged COTS software (C++, Java, > etc...). > Some languages are good for system software and embedded devices (C, C++, > etc...). > Many languages are most useful in very specific niches (Forth, Lisp, ADA, > XSLT, LOLCode, Objective-C, etc...) > > Most languages have multiple areas where they work well, and multiple areas > where they're not so good. > What exactly you want to accomplish in your software development should > drive the language choice, although it rarely does. > > No one particular language is the best choice for learning how to write > software; each type of software development will drive a different choice of > the best "first" language to learn. > > Mike, you need to specify your goal more precisely in order for the > community here to give you a useful recommendation that will help you best > accomplish that goal. > > ==Joseph++ > > Kevin Fries wrote: > > Wow, now I know why it is so hard to hire people that are competent! > Python is fun, not right, but fun... Thats your argument? If you want to > know why we refuse to hire Python programmers at our company, I can give you > real facts on why you should not use that language as a place to learn... > Not opinions. > > > > Kevin > > > > Sent from my Nokia phone > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Joshua Zeidner > > Sent: 02/20/2010 4:17:23 PM > > Subject: Re: > > > > On Sat, Feb 20, 2010 at 4:13 PM, Joshua Zeidner > wrote: > >> Seems like we have a lot of opinions here. Here is a paper from ACM > >> on the use of Python in for teaching programming. > >> > >> http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=114017 > > > > sorry wrong link: > http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1140123.1140177 > > > > -jmz > > > >> -jmz > >> > >> > >> On Sat, Feb 20, 2010 at 4:01 PM, Austin William Wright > >> wrote: > >>> Alan Dayley wrote: > >>>> Python. > >>>> > >>> Absolutely NOT PYTHON. It breaks the first two rules of programming, > the > >>> assignment operator (=) assigns values to a variable, and always ignore > >>> whitespace. Well my first two rules, at least. Plus it sucks at > >>> consistent use of object-oriented programming. > >>> > >>> If you *really* need a general-purpose programming language, look at > >>> Ruby, it's slightly more well behaved. Slightly. I would recommend > >>> Javascript, it's a major programming language, and you can run it in > >>> your web browser with literally nothing to install. Plus Javascript is > >>> closely related to XML and HTML, while not programming languages, are > >>> markup languages (a way of storing data) that is becoming very > important > >>> to know for many things. Though designed for the web, many of these > >>> things are finding themselves become part of everyday computing, > >>> especially XML. For these things, http://www.w3schools.com/ is > popular. > >>> > >>> Any scripting language might be a good start at learning about > >>> if/then/else logic, but none of these languages are going to teach how > >>> computers really *process* or *store* information on the inside (how > the > >>> CPU executes the program or how variables are stored in memory), or for > >>> that matter write an actual interactive computer program, you will need > >>> a real language like C or C++. After learning something like Javascript > >>> you will find C surprisingly limited in functionality if you try and do > >>> things the same way, especially variable-length variables like strings > >>> and arrays. Keep that fact in the back of your head for when, if, you > >>> attempt C/C++. > >>> > >>> Whatever you do, Google " tutorial" should bring up something good. > >>> In the way of books, however, you can't miss ones from O'Reilly ( > >>> http://oreilly.com/ ), they are jade/teal and have a random animal on > >>> the cover. > >>> > >>> Austin Wright. > >>> --------------------------------------------------- > >>> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > >>> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > >>> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > >>> > >> > >> > >> -- > >> http://home.joshuazeidner.com/ > >> > > > > > > > > > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > -- :-)~MIKE~(-: