Where to start with programming

[jccarson]

Well, I have a copy of Visual Studio 6 sitting here and would like to hear opinion on where to start in learning programming in C++. Any resources or thoughts on the matter would be greatly appreciated. Free (and legal) links to tutorial and how-to sites would also receive the same gratitude.

Thank you,

Joe

[sage45]

Here is a good website...

http://www.free-ed.net/catalog/itcat01.asp

-sage-

[jccarson]

Thanks for the link.

I do have a bevy of PDF and HTML C++ resources including the SAMS Teach yourself C++ in 21 days. I guess to further go into things, programming is a large subject area even when you narrow it down to one language such as C++. For those of you in the field already with any experience, I already know that this comment is obvious. Should I start with the SAMS Teach Yourself book or something else - as well I almost feel as if I need a guide for my never ending (once it starts) trip through programming - hopefully I can find that through forums like this - if not please someone let me know.

If it is beneficial, I can post tonight the complete listing of resources I have if that will help someone help me out.

Thank you,

Joe

[whackaxe]

i found this tutorial VERY good compared to some:

www.cplusplus.com/doc/tutorial

you should have some programing background though, because C++ is a very complicated language to grasp sometimes

[jrmorgan]

You know, I found that you get a good filtered selection by dropping by the college bookstore. These are good books with plenty of small programming projects to get you started and keep you practicing.

To get the best grasp of object-oriented programming, look for books by a guy named Wu (at work right now so don't have access to the name). I started my computer science degree with this guy's book on java programming. Starts you out with trying to understand the theory behind OOP before getting real deep in the language.

[sage45]

In response to your question... I would say that you never assign one single book as your bible... Instead, you should have a plethora of information to use at your fingertips... Basically, the more resources you have, the better.

-sage-

[Mhtml]

www.cprogramming.com is where I began.

[whackaxe]

www.cprogramming.com is great for forums, but their beginer tutorials aren't very well written. i got lost at pointers, the went to cplusplus.com

[krylite]

Hi, completely new here, though have had some programming done. Nice to meet you all.

these are just my opinions after having checked out books in the last 10 years for "learning" compiled languages programming.

For informal learning of C/C++

For C++, probably Teach yourself C++ by Al Stevens
I don't know about your SAMS book. Could be good enough to start.
C - C programming by Robert Lafore

For more of a formal setting..i.e. college courses.
Maybe after you get a hang of C/C++ syntax, then here are some of
the "classics" then get a exposure and intro to data structures..

Algorithms in C++ by Robert Sedgewick, good theory book plus examples
in C++
or Data Structures & Algorithm Analysis in C++ by Mark Allen Weiss who
also has a website with code to support the book. Forgot to mention, the book also does a nice small review of C++ in the beginning, a bit on perfomance analysis any code segments, the o() function, and a whole chapter on Standard Template Library(STL) at the end. (2nd ed.). A great
college textbook with practical value for C++ programming.

his site: www.cs.fiu.edu/~weiss

the textbook: http://www.awprofessional.com/title/0201361221

For exposure to nonimperative languages i.e. functional(more like Lisp, LOGO etc.)

Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs - Abelson, Sussman, the "classic" intro used at MIT. The book is FREE too in PDF form or something
at the mit sites. I forget exactly now. Don't ask me for questions about LISP or ML though, I took the course like 3 times and I still don't get fold, map, that well, and there is so much other stuff in the "practical" world to learn.

Prolog - Now maybe an academic language, though geniuses claim it can be used for systems programming, AI applications and other stuff. But it's one of the best in showing how programming can be done in formal logic.

ML for the working programmer - Paulson (UK book)
Prolog Programming in Depth - Convington, Nute, Vellino (I got frustrated with the
Sterling and Shaprio book)


As for exposure to Assembly, if you want to try it, the best for windows/dos systems is still probably Mastering Turbo Assembler by Tom Swan, much easier to read than that gross community college favorite textbook by Peter Abel. Though you need to get Borland Assembler, or some old MASM 5.1/6.0 somewhere from either borland's site for TASM or some other outlets.

There's also some CD's out there with data structures, learning C books all wrapped up into one CD usually from C++ Report magazine or some such. I'm sure it's on all those websites some place.

don't know too much about web languages in as which books to recommend, but I found the "visual quickstart" guides are great in getting right to the point with screen caps when I wanted to get something done in html, javascript, php , cgi-bin etc.

And finally as I stop rambling, most anything by Schildt or Jesse Liberty are easy to read quality books. For having fun learning , Andre LaMothe has game programming books with lots of geek jokes sprinkled throughout and a fun hobbyist reading style while summarizing Windows Programming, some AI, Direct X in a very accessible way.

[krylite]

Erk, forgot to mention, really great deal on getting started in programming.

John Hubbard's Schaum Outline books: Each only $13.95 list price and probably cheaper from the used sellers at amazon.

"Programming with JAVA"
"Programming with C++"

Very good and thorough. I used his JAVA book to learn JAVA and the C++ book as a reference.

There are hundreds of problems , but I'd recommend just working through the solved problems first to get through the book(best way to learn), then later find a particular "extra problem" as needed.

[lostinjava]

learning a programming language...and learning how to program an application are two different things....u might want to get hold of documentation which talks about things like structured programming, polymorphism etc...where n when to use an array or a hashmap (in the case of java).

for me, web based tutorials are great for gettin to grips with such concepts...books like (SAMS) seem to serve more as a reference for accomplishing certain singular tasks within a certain language, but seem to give little away in terms of how objects truely relate to each other, and how they can be used in other applications.

...Find me in the Java Jungle...