What should i do next to learn programming.

MoogPoo

Hi ive been doing c++ for a while now but havent made any proper programs yet. I made a chess game with text only but thats about it. So basically i know the syntax and algorithm design and basics of OOP but still dont get some things...

So what do you learn after the learning the language, i went through some opengl and win32 but it still seems ive so much more to do before being able to make anything really. As in I got a programming Linux book but all topics seem to be interelated and depend on other topics so when i try to read books like that I end up finishing and needing to read like 5 other books.

What are the main libraries and topics i should start to learn next? How do I improve from writing simple text programs on console to making real ones?

leahcim

I think what you need to do is decide on a project (maybe something you may need yourself) then start working on it.

When you hit a problem get out your books or search the web to find a solution.

The only way I learn a new programming language or library is by using it, the books are great for starting off and problem solving but won't be effective without the hands on work.

What are the main libraries and topics i should start to learn next?

It depends on the kind of software you want to write. If it is games you may want to look on the games forums to see what physics engines and graphics libraries are currently in vogue maybe for business software look at database technologies. Its really depends on what you want software you want to create.

How do I improve from writing simple text programs on console to making real ones?

Come up with an idea and just start, if you make mistakes so what, thats how most people learn.

kjl

Use another language, try c#. It has loads of easy to use front end tools which will have you doing winforms or asp pages in a couple of days.

You can start by downloading Visual Studios 2008 and playing around with a hello world program, then slowly relearn attributes, methods and objects.

It's about 20 times easier to get something working with this. Microsoft tend to look after their programmers, that's why they are still the number one operation system in the world.

Naikon

kjl wrote: »

Microsoft tend to look after their programmers, that's why they are still the number one operation system in the world.

LOL

They are the number one operating system for the DESKTOP market simply because of their monopoly. Once you move into embedded systems, medical systems, transaction processing(ie. non toy domains) Unix appears to rule the roost.

http://www.team.net/mjb/hawg.html

deadbloke

kjl wrote: »

Use another language, try c#. It has loads of easy to use front end tools which will have you doing winforms or asp pages in a couple of days.

You can start by downloading Visual Studios 2008 and playing around with a hello world program, then slowly relearn attributes, methods and objects.

It's about 20 times easier to get something working with this. Microsoft tend to look after their programmers, that's why they are still the number one operation system in the world.

I'd avoid moving onto a higher level laguage just yet. Spend some time getting comfortable with dealing hands-on with memory management, pointers and such like. When you have those in your armour, moving to another laguage will be a lot easier. As leahcim said, try some projects yourself, and don't be afraid to make mistakes. You'll learn a lot by breaking things.

p

Depending on what you're interested in, something like Cinder could be a next step.
It's a framework for creating interactive things, like camera tracking etc... It's fairly standalone and not aimed at very techy folks so could be of interest. Works on all major platforms too.

http://libcinder.org/