I have had allot of free time on my hands of late. A back injury back in 1999 finally caught up with me about a year ago and forced me out of my trade--plumber/pipefitter. As a result, I have been a full time student, and, a stay at home dad with allot of computer time. So, I have embarked on a number of learning projects: website building, Linux, and a few others.

Now, since I am learning Linux with all this command line stuff, I thought I would look into attaining some basic programming skills. I read post where someone says that they made their own little script to accomplish this or that and I think, "wow, that would be nice to learn!"

So, could some of you programming guru's point me in the right direction. Are there any good websites to learn from for beginners with no experience? I have the time, I just need to information. I can search google myself, but, some knowing where to start can be a daunting task--which language, etc etc.

Thanks for the help!

Head over to your local Barnes & Noble. They usually have great books on programming.

I tend to like books instead of on-line tutorials.

Good Luck

have you ever been in eastern NC? Barnes and Noble? We have to pipe sunlight into this god forsaken place! lol Actually, although we do not have one of the big name chain book stores, we do have some decent privately owned shops as well as a few good used books shops. So, I might check that out tomorrow. Online would be great, however, just simply because its free. And, knowing where to start would be good. There is perl and c+, etc. Which one is best to begin with?

Thanks

BOY! Do I feel like an idiot! One, I thought I had posted this in the Slackware forum. Not here. Two, I had never noticed that there is an actual Programming forum. Duh!

Moderator, could you please remove this thread so that I can search the programming forum for an answer before I post. I would hate to have the first post in a forum be a question that has been asked a million times! And, if I do ask over there, I do not want to violate the double post rule-a-ma-jiggy. Thanks!

This is one of the best sites I've found for programming, scripting, etc:

http://www.devshed.com

They've got a lot of tutorials, articles, and forums on different programming languages and scripting, web design and management, Operating Systems, etc. Someone there even made the mistake of posting a link to this forum, so I haven't been there nearly as much since then. But it sounds like it's just what you're looking for.

Enjoy!
--- Cerbere

If you want books, in my opinion there is no place better than O'Reilly.

Try getting your paws on "Beginning Programming For Dummies". Preferably from a second-hand bookshop or the like.

Very comprehensive for the absolute newby in Coding-land.

Agreed , it just deals with basic , but gives you good foundation ,regarding the general principles of programming.
If you never got any coding-experience before , this is the book , you're looking for.

....I just started with it myself.....

Check out bookpool.com and have a look at Running Linux, an O'Reilly title

I can't think of a good book on shell scripting but you will want to have a lookat Perl and certainly PHP for your web stuff. There is TONs of good stuff about both online.

Keep us posted on how your way cool adventure is going.

Everybody has their own personal experience learning to program. Looking back at mine, I would suggest this:

Learn to do shell scripting first. I'd probably start with bash scripting, and you can find two How-To documents at www.tldp.org. The reason I suggest scripting first is because you'll get instant gratification. There is no worrying about compilers, libraries, or the like. It will also give you a glimpse into what programming entails. When people say "you have to tell the computer exactly what to do", it's no exaggeration. Scripting will give you a taste so you can decide if you want to pursue it further.

After bash scripting, I would suggest Python. I don't like Perl because it's too easy to write sloppy code. Python will introduce you to some current programming concepts (like objects) as well as syntax and data structures similar to traditional programming languages. It also offers a shell-like environment to experiment in.

Then, if you're still looking to get into more, I would learn either C or C++. The majority of code you will find is probably written in one of those two languages.

You don't need to become an guru in bash scripting or Python if you decide to try them. Just get a feel for them; get comfortable in translating ideas into rough code. When you can do that, then take the next step.

I came to programming indirectly -- like our pipefitter friend is going to -- and indeed I do something else as a day job. I speak Perl, PHP and Java but now Dark_Helmet is giving me an excuse to study Python followed by C/C++

Thanks to you all for the suggestions! There certainly is enough here to cut my teeth on for a while. Seems like this community is extremely good and willing to help. I really appreciate the help!

Ooooh Ooooh, I almost forgot the RUTE User's Guide. It's my bible, Linux-wise. Check it out here:

http://wwwacs.gantep.edu.tr/linux/rute/

then download it here:

http://www.icon.co.za/~psheer/rute-home.html

Enjoy!
--- Cerbere

i found java was nice and simple to start with and then from that it is really easy to get into stuff like C and C++

But i also hear Eifel has a really nice syntax and is really easy to get started in...

also, if you are looking for resources... some universities put up some really great online references, and you can even go through their lecture notes and stuff if you dont have to log into the website. So i guess you could find a university, look up their intro programming courses and check their websites to see if they have pdfs of the lecture slides and stuff.

what about gtk?

GTK isn't a programming language. It's a C/C++ toolkit for creating GUIs in those languages (and others using language bindings).