I want to learn, I swear!

[iago]

Java is object oriented and has loads of libraries at your disposal so you're not writing or searching for software to do very trivial things, unlike C, and is syntactically consistent and is overall much cleaner than C++.

Object orientation is often more harmful than good to a new programmer, because it's a trickier paradigm.

Also, doing things from scratch is a good way to learn. You should have an understaning of how sort() works, THEN you're at the point where you never have to use it again.

Another advantage of Java over C#, by the way, is that Java is free. You can develop Java in a nice IDE (Eclipse) for 100% free, whereas Visual Studio will set you back a lot. I actually get free versions of Visual Studio from Microsoft conferences and courses, but I don't think there's a free one available for general people (I could be wrong, though).

[Sidoh]

Object orientation is often more harmful than good to a new programmer, because it's a trickier paradigm.

That's true, but for beginning programmers, they don't have to use any of the OO features.  Sure, there's a bunch of extra boilerplate stuff they have to deal with, but I'd hope it's something that's manageable.

Also, doing things from scratch is a good way to learn. You should have an understaning of how sort() works, THEN you're at the point where you never have to use it again.

That's true, but sometimes it's easier to learn something if you're able to treat something as a black box.  For example, not having something like ArrayList or vector is pretty fucking annoying in any cases.

Another advantage of Java over C#, by the way, is that Java is free. You can develop Java in a nice IDE (Eclipse) for 100% free, whereas Visual Studio will set you back a lot. I actually get free versions of Visual Studio from Microsoft conferences and courses, but I don't think there's a free one available for general people (I could be wrong, though).

You are.

The Express editions of Visual Studio are free.

[iago]

That's true, but for beginning programmers, they don't have to use any of the OO features.  Sure, there's a bunch of extra boilerplate stuff they have to deal with, but I'd hope it's something that's manageable.

It's definitely manageable, but I hated being told by my teachers "just ignore this stuff". Fortunately, I already knew what it meant since one of my first languages was C++, but I dislike having that kind of crap around.

That's true, but sometimes it's easier to learn something if you're able to treat something as a black box.  For example, not having something like ArrayList or vector is pretty fucking annoying in any cases.

Definitely true, but using certain classes without knowing how it works can be bad. Here's an anecdote (a couple more of these and we'll have data!):

I was using Excel the other day. I had a huge (60,000 or so.. that's huge for Excel) list of ip addresses in column A and a count in column B. Column A had duplicates, and I wanted to know the total numbers. So in column C, I did "sumif(A:A, A1, B:B)", then pasted that formula in all 60,000 cells. After about a minute of Excel being frozen, it occurred to me that I was doing 60,000² operations, and that Excel can't handle 3.6 billion operations in any reasonable time. So, I killed the process, went back, and did it in a far more optimal way.

My point, besides that that's a neat story, is that if I hadn't known how the functions work on the inside, I wouldn't have known how to fix the problem.

So yeah.. I realize we aren't really disagreeing, but I just wanted to tell that story.

You are.

The Express editions of Visual Studio are free.

Nice, didn't know that!

Any idea what the downside is? I didn't click the link or anything, but I'm guessing they're fully functional for learning purposes, but you can't use them for professional development?

[Joe]

From Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_Studio_Express

The idea of express editions, according to Microsoft, is to provide streamlined, easy-to-use and easy-to-learn IDEs for users other than professional software developers, such as hobbyists and students.

    * No IDE support for databases other than SQL Server Express and Microsoft Access
    * No support for Web Applications with ASP.NET (this can instead be done with Visual Web Developer Express, though the non-Express version of Visual Studio allows both web and windows applications from the same IDE)
    * No support for developing for mobile devices (no templates or emulator)
    * No Crystal Reports
    * Fewer project templates (e.g. Windows services template, Excel Workbook template)
    * Limited options for debugging and breakpoints
    * No support for creating Windows Services (Can be gained through download of a project template)
    * No support for OpenMP

And according to this, the express editions lack support for addons (such as SVN support), doesn't come with full MSDN integration, and can't target 64-bit, Itanium, or Windows Mobile.

But basically, it's right up deadly's isle.

[Ribose]

You are.

The Express editions of Visual Studio are free.

Nice, didn't know that!

Any idea what the downside is? I didn't click the link or anything, but I'm guessing they're fully functional for learning purposes, but you can't use them for professional development?

I use the Express editions all the time for C# development. It looks like that's exactly what they are: for non-professional development. As far as I know I can compile programs that do everything possible with the language itself. The IDE is missing features that might be useful to have like third-party extensibility (IDE add-ons), some breakpoint features, some automatic refactoring features, some debugging features, and others. But personally I'm not spending money just for those.

joetheodd beat me to this post.

[deadly7]

What about other languages do you understand that gives them an advantage over Java?  Unless you're writing software that's really performance critical, C has almost no advantage over Java.  Java is object oriented and has loads of libraries at your disposal so you're not writing or searching for software to do very trivial things, unlike C, and is syntactically consistent and is overall much cleaner than C++.  C# is fine too, but unless you start with the basics, I think it's very easy to get overwhelmed with all of the capabilities of the .NET framework.

It's also a rather non-trivial advantage that you get cross-platform compatibility for free.  It's awesome to be able to go on any computer I own and pick up development from where I left off, despite that it was started on linux while I'm on OSX now.

Nothing, but in having been a user of Java I know that I hate it. Any large-ish program (from the old school Azureus to OOo to countless others) has been sluggish and a burden to deal with. Granted, my computer is ancient by today's standards, but that is something I'd like to avoid.

I will admit cross-platform compatibility is nice to have. I jump around from WinXP, WinVista, Win7, Mac OSX, and Ubuntu usually every business day.

From the sounds of things, since C & Java are similar to MATLAB they might be a good stepping point. Anyone know of any good resources (other than googling "how do i code xyz") to learning syntax/functions/etc for these languages?

[iago]

FWIW, OOo, by and large, isn't Java.

[deadly7]

FWIW, OOo, by and large, isn't Java.

Didn't it used to? I recall whenever I ran some of the later 1.x versions the Java Runtime Environment would also load.

[iago]

FWIW, OOo, by and large, isn't Java.

Didn't it used to? I recall whenever I ran some of the later 1.x versions the Java Runtime Environment would also load.

The JRE is required for some optional features, but never for the full suite. I looked it up before I posted, just to be sure.

[rabbit]

FWIW, awk can suck it.

[iago]

How come?

'awk' is one of the major Linux utilities (probably the only one) that I haven't tried to learn. Someday, I'll have to learn it, but I'm curious why you don't like it?

[Sidoh]

How come?

'awk' is one of the major Linux utilities (probably the only one) that I haven't tried to learn. Someday, I'll have to learn it, but I'm curious why you don't like it?

Awk is wonderful for quick and dirty text manipulation, but that's really all it's meant for.  I've used it a decent amount, and I definitely feel like it's an awesome tool to have at your disposal.

[iago]

How come?

'awk' is one of the major Linux utilities (probably the only one) that I haven't tried to learn. Someday, I'll have to learn it, but I'm curious why you don't like it?

Awk is wonderful for quick and dirty text manipulation, but that's really all it's meant for.  I've used it a decent amount, and I definitely feel like it's an awesome tool to have at your disposal.

Yeah, that's kinda what I thought. I frequently find myself using grep/sed/cut/xargs in a hackish way to get the same functionality I could have with awk.

Someday...