Topic.

Just wondering what would be the best way to learn this form of coding.

the best way is to take the red pill and ask tank to load it. but for us blue pillers, it'll take hard work.

if you already know another comparable language, find websites/videos/books comparing the two. so if you knew java, look for a book/website/video like "c for java developers". if you dont know another comparable language, find videos/websites/books aimed at beginners. if you're going for a book, check amazon for reviews.

regardless, you need to practice.

Also, assuming you know some sort of basics about programming in general, it's nice to start off with a beginner type project, something that doesn't take weeks and weeks to do, but isn't as trivial as "Hello World". Much like any hobby/profession and like carteblanche said, the key is practice, nobody becomes a superstar overnight.

start with c.
try to learn all datatypes and the syntax.
to achieve that, just code something interesting, maybe conways game of life?

If you are going to learn C++, do not start with C.

Anyway, if you just want to learn one of those languages, just do it™.

If you want to learn programming in general, try starting with python, its syntax is similar to that of the languages you mentioned, but it lets you learn without worrying about things like memory allocations and stuff.

at this point I don't think it matters what language he starts with.

It does matter if he's new to programming. Starting with low level languages like C forces the user to learn several concepts at once - or learn the wrong way to do some things because they can't grasp the proper yet.

I don't think that is correct at all

I once believed that when I first started. Nowadays I think it doesn't really matter what you start on as long as you are going in with the right goals in mind...

This post was edited by Eep on Dec 8 2013 05:43pm

I'm not saying it's impossible; obviously, there are a lot of people who started with programming in machine code directly. But it is harder.

Take reading stdin - something pretty much everyone starts with. In C, you need to handle strings and integers differently (you scanf to string string to buf, but an int to &val), you need to remember to allocate enough memory for your strings and remember not to overflow the buffer.

In python or ruby it's sys.stdin.readline() and STDIN.readline() respectively.

So, yeah. Instead of learning a number of concepts they'd have to learn one at a time.

So: impossible? No. Ineffective? Yes.

Learn C# it's a business language, and winforms make it easy as shit to get an app up and running in under 5 minutes. By business language I mean, errbody round dem business wurld b uzin it.