[VirtualFrost]

I've always told myself I wanted to be some kind of programmer/game developer when I'm older. I have lots of spare time and I just can't get myself to even get into learning a language. I spent the last couple days understanding the very basics of Java and already feel like it isn't the language I want to learn as I don't even know what I'd wanna make in Java. A couple hours ago I remembered about Garry's Mod and now just want to learn Lua. I find myself always jumping to learn different languages and the cycle keeps repeating. Is it just not the career I want? I'm all into technology, maybe it's just I cannot be self-taught with coding and that maybe once I'm in college I'd actually learn. Does anyone else have this happening?

[Diego]

I've always told myself I wanted to be some kind of programmer/game developer when I'm older. I have lots of spare time and I just can't get myself to even get into learning a language. I spent the last couple days understanding the very basics of Java and already feel like it isn't the language I want to learn as I don't even know what I'd wanna make in Java. A couple hours ago I remembered about Garry's Mod and now just want to learn Lua. I find myself always jumping to learn different languages and the cycle keeps repeating. Is it just not the career I want? I'm all into technology, maybe it's just I cannot be self-taught with coding and that maybe once I'm in college I'd actually learn. Does anyone else have this happening?

I think whats drawing you to learn the languages is what you can do with them but you're not learning enough to do what you want. For instance you want to learn Lua to make Garrysmod content but you are going to start Lua and quit after a bit because you are bored by learning and cant instantly create the content. Another example would be learning java to make Android applications but quitting while learning the language and never creating the apps. I think you should try to force your self to learn a language until you are able to create what draws you to the language then you will be able to see if coding is for you. If coding is not your thing don't make a career out of something that you don't enjoy. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. :P

[meow]

Never start with Java... just no.

Also, find a motivation. I know how you feel.

[lux]

You shouldn't learn a language.

You should learn concepts, patterns, and design. Once you understand these concepts, you can [u]understand[u] the syntax of a language and apply said concepts.

[Killpot]

I wouldn't go in with the intent to learn a language just to learn it, as you really never stop learning a language and it gets daunting when you look at what you have left to "learn", I mean, at what point do you become "good" at a language? and by who's standard? If I were you I would find something you're passionate in, like gaming or something, and make a program to aid you with it. That's how I got into programming, by making a simple batch script to install mods for World of Tanks, it was well received and it pushed me to go on. I would say just start coding to code, don't worry about cramming material down your throat, just take it as you need to learn.

[dunderbutt2000]

I've been in your position. Take my advice:

Don't wait until college, thinking that it will motivate you; it won't. In a CS major, the students that are really worth their salt will have already begun learning beforehand. Be that student. I wasn't and ended up dropping out after the first semester because of it (plus it was too expensive).
Also, if you wait until college to really get into it, you may end up hating it and switching majors, which wastes time and money. Best to figure out if you like it beforehand.

I don't know what this site's thoughts toward reddit are, but the FAQ on the /r/learnprogramming subreddit is a fantastic place to start to figure out what you want to do/what language to start with. It helped me to decide on web development, which I'm now working on self-teaching myself until I can save up enough money to go back to school.

I've only just recently gotten over the hump of "this is boring, I'm going to play video games instead" to "hey, this is actually pretty interesting" just recently. It takes time, but if you really do think you want to learn programming, then you'll eventually get into it.

[Satan]

Don't wait until college, thinking that it will motivate you; it won't. In a CS major, the students that are really worth their salt will have already begun learning beforehand.

Accurate. I took computer courses through middle school and high school, and during high school attended a vocational school for computer programming.

Actually will be starting to study C++ two semesters before that class begins on my own, so that I don't struggle like my other classmates will likely be, assuming they don't follow the same path as me.

Also, learning the basics of languages and getting to know how comfortable you are with them doesn't mean you lack motivation. If anything, had you lacked motivation you would have just tried one and said "Oh well I guess I'm not cut out for this."

I taught myself to code long before my vocational school, and had the logic of how it all worked as my own thought process already.


If you want it, work for it. And based on what you've said, you want it. Don't doubt yourself as far as if it is for you or not.





At the same time, don't have grand expectations for any language you learn either. They can be very powerful and do limitless things, but to get to that level, you have to go far beyond the basics.

For example, I made a tic-tac-toe game in VB for one of my classes. Exceptionally basic things, but everyone else in the class with the same assignment couldn't wrap their minds around how to get it to function. Everyone had their form all set up, elements in place, and a general frame for the game, but getting the logic behind it, the ifs, checking, switching, etc, required combining things in a way they were never shown.

The point of the assignment is to realise that even though you may know the basics, unless you actually understand the fundamentals of how they work and how you can use them together, you may as well just be making popup buttons.

Keep trying languages until you find one you really enjoy using, and really dive into it, even before college.

[mothered]

Simply stated, prior to delving Into (In your case) programming, you need to have an objective and know where you're heading

Once that's defined, It will not be too difficult at all to make a decision as to the type of programming language to select. Without direction, there's no starting point. You need to establish a starting point to see where you're heading. Everything else will progressively fall Into place thereafter.

[VirtualFrost]

I think whats drawing you to learn the languages is what you can do with them but you're not learning enough to do what you want. For instance you want to learn Lua to make Garrysmod content but you are going to start Lua and quit after a bit because you are bored by learning and cant instantly create the content. Another example would be learning java to make Android applications but quitting while learning the language and never creating the apps. I think you should try to force your self to learn a language until you are able to create what draws you to the language then you will be able to see if coding is for you. If coding is not your thing don't make a career out of something that you don't enjoy. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say.

Exactly, I see the potential in what languages can do, but eventually I just look at other peoples work and just get bored with the learning. I understand myself and have seen over and over again that you cannot learn anything in a day which is 100% true, even though that's in my mind, I just cannot help myself. I'm going to continue to stick with Java, I wanted to try Python, however there isn't much use for me there, even if it may be a good language to start. I understand what you're saying though thank you.

Never start with Java... just no.

Also, find a motivation. I know how you feel.

I've seen that Java can be a good language to begin with. I've 'started' with many languages and I didn't feel as though this was any harder of a language. I keep Google docs of different 'guides/cheat sheets' of languages, I have JavaScript, NodeJS, Python, SQL and just the command line. I cannot think of another language I'd wanna try get into.

You shouldn't learn a language.

You should learn concepts, patterns, and design. Once you understand these concepts, you can [u]understand[u] the syntax of a language and apply said concepts.

Any links or recommendations to material I can look into about this? Not sure where I'd start with that one.

I wouldn't go in with the intent to learn a language just to learn it, as you really never stop learning a language and it gets daunting when you look at what you have left to "learn", I mean, at what point do you become "good" at a language? and by who's standard? If I were you I would find something you're passionate in, like gaming or something, and make a program to aid you with it. That's how I got into programming, by making a simple batch script to install mods for World of Tanks, it was well received and it pushed me to go on. I would say just start coding to code, don't worry about cramming material down your throat, just take it as you need to learn.

I have heard that you never stop learning which I feel is true, there are so many different ways, and all these new things always being developed that you can use. I've always mostly just wanted to either create a mod for a game, or some kind of application. I know right now I've been trying to learn to make a simple calculator but the hardest part at the moment just seems to be the GUI of it because there's JFrame and WindowBuilder and so many of the tutorials are out of date. I could of just been having a bad day and wanted to end learning, bad mindset to have.

I've been in your position. Take my advice:

Don't wait until college, thinking that it will motivate you; it won't. In a CS major, the students that are really worth their salt will have already begun learning beforehand. Be that student. I wasn't and ended up dropping out after the first semester because of it (plus it was too expensive).
Also, if you wait until college to really get into it, you may end up hating it and switching majors, which wastes time and money. Best to figure out if you like it beforehand.

I don't know what this site's thoughts toward reddit are, but the FAQ on the /r/learnprogramming subreddit is a fantastic place to start to figure out what you want to do/what language to start with. It helped me to decide on web development, which I'm now working on self-teaching myself until I can save up enough money to go back to school.

I've only just recently gotten over the hump of "this is boring, I'm going to play video games instead" to "hey, this is actually pretty interesting" just recently. It takes time, but if you really do think you want to learn programming, then you'll eventually get into it.

I've actually taught myself web development, however not the advanced stuff (PHP/JavaScript). I can create 'nice' web pages with CSS and HTML and have a whole folder full of websites I've created. For some reason it isn't something I want to do, but at the same time I feel it was a good skill to obtain as I was able to just code out my own web pages for my site to use(Which reminds me I still have to finish it off ugh). I knew about learnprogramming, might take another look into it now and see if I can get any info. What you said is the plan for me, I want to learn in advance so I'm able to have that head start and do well at least. However I know that colleges can be different with what language they're doing. I have two friends in two different colleges in basically the same course, one is doing C++ and the other started on Python.

Accurate. I took computer courses through middle school and high school, and during high school attended a vocational school for computer programming.

Actually will be starting to study C++ two semesters before that class begins on my own, so that I don't struggle like my other classmates will likely be, assuming they don't follow the same path as me.

Also, learning the basics of languages and getting to know how comfortable you are with them doesn't mean you lack motivation. If anything, had you lacked motivation you would have just tried one and said "Oh well I guess I'm not cut out for this."

I taught myself to code long before my vocational school, and had the logic of how it all worked as my own thought process already.


If you want it, work for it. And based on what you've said, you want it. Don't doubt yourself as far as if it is for you or not.





At the same time, don't have grand expectations for any language you learn either. They can be very powerful and do limitless things, but to get to that level, you have to go far beyond the basics.

For example, I made a tic-tac-toe game in VB for one of my classes. Exceptionally basic things, but everyone else in the class with the same assignment couldn't wrap their minds around how to get it to function. Everyone had their form all set up, elements in place, and a general frame for the game, but getting the logic behind it, the ifs, checking, switching, etc, required combining things in a way they were never shown.

The point of the assignment is to realise that even though you may know the basics, unless you actually understand the fundamentals of how they work and how you can use them together, you may as well just be making popup buttons.

Keep trying languages until you find one you really enjoy using, and really dive into it, even before college.

We once created a Yahtzee game using Delphi (I'd say it was one of the most ancient languages I've learnt, but it really helped) in which after that, I created a fully automated poker game, still had it's bugs. I was hoping to create that again in Java. I mentioned earlier, firstly I wanted to do a calculator as that seems the most basic, and gives me a chance to show that I can use basic math operators, variables and other mostly basic stuff. The struggle right now is getting a tutorial that shows up to date versions of JFrame or WindowBuilder which so far I've had no success on even how to setup the GUI.

Simply stated, prior to delving Into (In your case) programming, you need to have an objective and know where you're heading

Once that's defined, It will not be too difficult at all to make a decision as to the type of programming language to select. Without direction, there's no starting point. You need to establish a starting point to see where you're heading. Everything else will progressively fall Into place thereafter.

I think yesterday I just spent too long trying to work on a GUI and only finding bad tutorials to work with just annoyed me and I thought I wasn't getting the right answers.

I am overwhelmed by everyones response, so much quality here, thank you all so much. After reading all this I'm going to spend the next couple hours and continue to go back and try to continue my calculator project.

[Mustnabs]

I find it more difficult to learn online to be honest. It's much better in a class.
You may be different, did you try looking up some sites that teach to code?