Date: Sat, 09 Sep 2000 18:29:30 -0500 From: nathan <beemern@telecom.ksu.edu> To: j mckitrick <jcm@FreeBSD-uk.eu.org>, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: RE: what language should i learn next ? Message-ID: <39BAC7DA.AFBB5768@telecom.ksu.edu>
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>I want to set the goal of learning a new language in the next couple of
>months. These are the ones I am considering:
>perl
>python
>shell scripting (I am weak in this)
>java (no freebsd support yet, right?)
i'll throw my $.02 in : learn Perl
shell scripting is a must ... 'specially if you see yourself working on
different systems/shells
knowing the quirks/behaviors/differences between sh/bash/tcsh/korn/et
al makes life much easier when working on different machines where you
can't always dictate what shells will be available, or will even WORK
with the apps that must run on it.
however, as far as learning a more formal 'programming language'.. my
vote is Perl.
for a VERY good starter article, check out:
http://www.perl.com/pub/2000/01/10PerlMyths.html
its the first thing i read back when i started with perl.
what i like about it, and is mentioned in the above page, is its
extremely effective in 2 lines, as well as 2000. You can do anything.
with regular expressions, you can reformat all sorts of unwieldy text
with 1 or 2 lines... hell using the -e switch, you can just write the
code from the command line (: or , combined with Tk, you can program a
nice looking GUI front-end for a production database with 10million +
records.. on Microsoft SQL 7 even...
its also supported on virtually any platform imaginable.. when i was
writing the above db app, i had the sources in one place, would work on
them under fbsd/solaris at work, then do some more work on em from home
under win98
check out Active Perl -> www.activestate.com (?) their ppm (module
library) makes life easy, but alotta the modules aren't ported to
*nix(s).. its more win32 oriented.. but worked for me none-the-less
(:
i can't speak for python.. never used it.
Java is very popular, and a good language in its own right. getting
better every day. its API documentation is the best of any language
i've seen (IMHO) there are ports for it for fbsd.. both native, and
thru Linux EMU. i'm running both, and javax.swing seems a bit
unpredictable thru Linux EMU.. but that's another story...
btw.. i don't consider myself a gifted programmer by ANY stretch.. and i
picked up shell/perl/java pretty quickly.. they are all easy to get
into.. the 'trick' is to just program, program, program,....
hth.. & good luck!
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