Programming novice

Hello there,

I have quite a good experience with computers in general and I have good logic skills. I work with data systems and I am keen to learn some programming. I have experience in using using Macromedia Director a few years ago and I wrote some reasonably good code to create a basic 2d RPG manipulating graphics with code etc. I have experience in Dos prompt for writing batch files and I am quite an advanced excel user.

I am looking at learning some form of programming for database/data manipulation and I am looking for some sugestions. I would propably rather work in an opensource environment such as linux but my terminal skills are very limited at the moment so any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you

 

Well, it depends on what the end game is... Are you looking to just have some fun and write some things for your own use? Are you looking to build a career out of it? Are you thinking of starting a website?

There are many areas of programming, and many different languages for those different areas. If you can let us know what you would ultimately like to do, we can give better direction.

 

I would probably say a little of both. I dont want to build a career out of programming but I do work in data managment and I would with some quite large datasets. It would be good if I could learn some programming to make life easier. I know I could look at SQL for data management but I dont know whether that translates onto linux?

The more fun stuff would be designing online games like flash stuff but I dont think there are any open source options for that?

 

Incidentally, understand the principles of programming and I work with a guy who does do programming and I oftern give him the programming logic and leave him to work out the syntax.

 

Eh, SQL and linux are two separate things. I'm currently working on mssql language and powershell. I currently have a long ways to go.

 

No I get that but I dont know if you can use SQL on linux or if it is limited to Windows. Im a relative novice when it comes to linux but its open source nature by deffinition means that it is programmer friendly

 

Hi Teuer.

I think that's a leap too far to say that the Linux is "programmer friendly" just because it's open source.
It doesn't sound like you'll be trying to modify or enhance the operating system.
That's just the environment in which you will be developing and running your programs.

I used to work with a language called Clipper which began as a compiler for the dBase III language, which was specifically designed for database applications.
Clipper and dBase were designed for the MS-DOS environment.
Clipper has evolved into an open source project known as the Harbour Project

I have never used the open source version.
I bought the last commercial version of Clipper which was v5.3 which received two patches, 5.3a and then 5.3b.

 

You can definitely use SQL on Linux. I don't have any experience with that, so I can't help you there. The most well known open source SQL server would probably be MySQL, which can run on Linux.

If you are just looking to get into some programming, Microsoft has a free version of Visual Studio, called 'Express'. They also have a SQL Server express. The only caveat is that you can't use it to develop commercial applications. Visual Studio is a very powerful tool and there are a lot of references and tutorials on the internet. C# could be a good place to start. I would stay away from VB, initially, because it can be easy to pick up bad habits.

 

Does that apply to both Visual Studio Express and SQL Server Express?

 

http://www.microsoft.com/express/Support/Support-faq.aspx

I take it back. It looks like there are no restrictions on commercial use. I thought I had read previously that they were only for non-commercial use, but maybe that was an earlier version.

 

Cool. :cool
Thanks!