As you get more comfortable with a programming language, using a more advanced editor is recommended, as it can make coding and testing the code more efficient. If you're on a Mac, you can use their free editor named TextEdit. Also, it is good to keep in mind that visual programming languages, like Visual Basic, include the editor and compiler in the same tool used to create programs.
Most computer programming languages are high-level programming languages , meaning they are easy for you to understand, but impossible for a computer to understand. For the computer to "read" your program, it must be compiled or have an interpreter.
Your choice of programming language is the deciding factor on whether or not you'll need a third-party program to compile or interpret it. For example, Eclipse is an interpreter that takes a program written in Java and "translates" it into code understood by a computer. Other languages, like Perl, are interpreted, meaning they do not need to be compiled. These languages only require that they are installed on the computer or the server that is running the script.
After you have decided on a programming language, editor, and compiler, you are ready to program. For most users, the easiest way to start is with the famous " Hello World! After you have run your program that prints "Hello World!
To do so, you need to understand the following concepts:. See our programming terms for a full list programming-related terms. Yes No.
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Cookie Settings. Learn why people trust wikiHow. Download Article Explore this Article parts. Tips and Warnings. Related Articles. Article Summary. Part 1. Choose a programming language. Computer programming is done as essentially a set of written instructions that the computer follows also known as binary coding. These instructions can be written in several different "languages", or which are simply different ways of organizing the instructions and text.
Different languages tend to be used to create different types of programs, however, so choose a language that you feel is relevant to what you want to do. These languages are mainly used for creating standalone computer applications such as games. They are popular and widely used, though C , a language very similar to Java, is starting to become much more common.
Consider Java or JavaScript. These are good languages to learn if you want to work on making web plugins JavaScript or mobile apps Java. These languages are very much in demand right now, so they are handy to know. Keep in mind that Java and JavaScript are completely different languages, despite the similarity in names. Try Python. Python is a very versatile language used widely across several platforms. Consider PHP. It is a web programming language and relatively easy to learn due to its weak typing and popularity popularity means there will be several useful tutorials on the language.
It is a great language for server-side programming. Don't limit yourself to these languages! There are tons of programming languages, all with varying uses. If you want to work as a programmer, you will need to know more than one, so learn as many as you can. Your best bet will be to look at ads for the sort of jobs you want to get and look for the common languages that they ask for.
Part 2. Think about going to school. While most companies hiring a programmer will care more about your skills than the college you went to or your grades, it greatly helps to have a college degree to point to. You will learn more efficiently than if you teach yourself, all while getting expert guidance from your teachers and maybe your friends.
There are often scholarships and grants available to those doing degrees in this field. Don't feel intimidated by the price tag of a degree: it is possible!
Learn from online universities. Whether you do an online degree with fees and an actual degree at the end or you're attending a free program like MIT's wonderful Coursera, you can learn a lot about programming from these structured courses.
Try using online tools. These companies want more developers to help their platforms flourish and their resources can be some of the best on the web.
Learn using online tutorials. There are loads of programmers with websites where they will teach you the individual basics, as well as a few tricks. Look up tutorials on the language you want to learn to find these. Many free online classes are available to learn to code from.
The Khan Academy teaches computer coding, with easy tutorials and videos. Codecademy is another free site to learn from, with step-by-step tutorials. Start young if you can. There are several programs designed to teach kids to program. Programs like MIT's Scratch are very helpful and the younger you are, the easier it will be to pick up like any language. Avoid kits, as these rarely teach anything useful. Part 3. Start with a good book or tutorial on programming. Get a good, current book on the programming language you want to learn.
Reviews on Amazon or similar sites will usually help you identify helpful books from unhelpful ones. Get an interpreter for that language. An interpreter is just another computer program but it will convert ideas you've written in a programming language into "machine code" so you can see things work. Lots of programs are available and you will need to choose one that is appropriate for you. Read the book! Take examples of the programming language from the book and put them into your interpreter.
Try changing the examples and making the program do different things. This HTML tutorial is a good place to start. JavaScript is the programming language of the web browser, the magic that makes dynamic in-page effects go.
JavaScript is also the stuff of bookmarklets, Greasemonkey user scripts, and Ajax , so it's the key to making all sorts of web goodies. Start learning JavaScript here. Server-side scripting: Once you're good at making things happen inside a web page, you're going to need to put some dynamic server action behind it—and for that, you'll need to move into a server-side scripting language, like PHP, Python, Perl, or Ruby.
For example, to make a web-based contact form that sends an email somewhere based on what a user entered, a server-side script is required. Scripting languages like PHP can talk to a database on your web server as well, so if you want to make a site where users can log in and store information, that's the way to go.
Excellent web development site Webmonkey is full of tutorials for various web programming languages. PHP's online documentation and function reference is the best on the web. Each entry like this one on the strlen function includes user comments at the bottom which are often as helpful as the documentation itself.
I happen to be partial to PHP, but there are plenty of other server-side scripting languages you might decide to go with instead. Web frameworks: Over the years, web developers have had to solve and resolve the same problems and rewrite similar code to build dynamic web sites. To avoid making everyone reinvent the wheel for every new web development project, some programmers have come up with development frameworks that do some repetitive work for you.
The popular Ruby on Rails framework, for example, takes the Ruby programming language and offers a web-specific structure for getting common web application tasks done. In fact, Adam used Rails to build his first serious and impressive! Here's his take on how to build a web site from scratch with no experience. For example, if you want to put a dynamic map on your web site, you want to use a Google Map instead of building your own custom map.
Almost every modern web service you know and love has an API that lets you include data and widgets from it in your application, like Twitter, Facebook, Google Docs, Google Maps, and the list goes on. Integrating other webapps into your web application via API's is the final frontier of rich web development. Every good, major web service API offers thorough documentation and some sort of quick start guide to try it out here's Twitter's , for example. Go crazy. If you want to write a program that takes textual or file input and outputs something useful, the command line is the right place to do it.
While the command line isn't as sexy or good-looking as a webapp or desktop app, for rapid development of quick scripts that automate processes, you can't beat it. Several scripting languages that work on a Linux-based web server also work at the command line, like Perl, Python, and PHP—so learning one of those baddies makes you conversant in two contexts.
My path never took me too far down the Perl road, but I taught myself Python using the excellent and free online book, Dive into Python. If becoming a Unix ninja is one of your programmer goals, you absolutely must get good at shell scripting with bash. Without any experience writing bash scripts beyond a dozen lines, I wound up developing a full-on personal to-do list manager in bash, Todo. Nowadays, modern webapps and browsers are extensible with with bits of software that bolt onto them and add features.
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