New to programming, which language is better?

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mtnbording

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I'm new to programming and I just downloaded the Developers tools. I was wondering which language is easier to learn but you can do a lot of things with it. (C, Objective C, C++, Carbon, Cocoa, and Applescript.) If it helps I've done VERY little programming in AppleScript, and Basic.


thanks for your help,
Matt
 
Your list contains, in fact, only two types of languages:

- AppleScript, which is a pilot language designed for telling applications how to behave.

- C/C++/Obj-C are all ANSI-C languages. Carbon and Coca respectively are OS9/0SX and OSX-only applications.

Depending on what you are aiming at, either is good: to script your system, use AppleScript. To build complete applications, use the Obj-C tools.

For sure, AppleScript is simpler.
 
Do you mind to use the Java Programming Language?
It is portable, fast, easy to use, very supported, free, ....

C/C++ are useful to build CPU-intensive applications but aren't easy to mantain, debug .... Objective-C has many advantage over C/C++ but is "dead"; Java have the same advantage of Java, is more easy, has great application support to debug, profile, etc..., and have a great library to build Graphical User Interface.

Depending on the application to build there is the betetr Programming Language.

Feel free to ask more explanations.
(I use programming in C/C++ but my las applications was made in Java).

Bye_
 
Java is the way to go.
I've never come acrossed a better designed programming language than this!! heh.

ofcourse it's not easy writing GUI apps in Java as compared to just drawing it out in Interface Builder which uses Cocoa. But hey u could use a Cocoa-Java combo!!

objective-c isin't bad at all, it's better than c++ heh,

all languages are good, learn a few and get well-versed with them(i.e understand their pros and corns) thus, ur not limited to a perticular language.

anyhow, Java, Objective-C and the like, are dynamic general purpose programming languages. (i,e they were designed, with the idea of being well designed)

while languages such as C/C++ are static systems/general purpose programming languages. (i.e, they were designed for performance and to give the programmer complete control on the machine, which is as i said usually usefull for systems programming [operating systems], but they have been used in other fields as well)

you want to create applications: so Java/Objective-C/C# is the best choice for you.

Yes C# as well, after all it's supposed to be the remodified C++. (but a lot more dynamic, similar to Java). It's not a bad language at all.
And it won't take off, since we all hate M$.
 
Hello,

The many different existing computer languages were created to fit different needs. The right language depends what you want to do. On MacOSX the prevalent languages are,

Applescript - its primary use is automation. Applescript studio lets you add UI to your scripts. The syntax is frustratingly English-like. You would be amazed at what you can do.

Obj-C is not dead but is proprietary to MacOSX. Most Apple products are written in Obj-C. It is very powerful but has a syntax and object model that is significantly different from the norm. It tends to make seasoned programmers uncomfortable J If you are writing a MacOsX only app, this is ideal. The Obj-C framework is Cocoa.

C - it is the non-object-oriented foundation of C++ and Objective C. It offers nothing the other languages don?t. The Carbon library is a C interface available in C++ as well.

C++ is the most prevalent applications language. You can design extremely fast and flexible applications. It can go as low level as moving bits around and as high as most OO languages. Apple doesn't provide a decent C++ framework, yet. There are many third party frameworks available. Some are free. The problems with C++ is - it don?t do memory management, it has a higher learning curve, and depends highly on the quality of framework you are using.

Java ? is often called the write-once-debug-everywhere language. Its purpose is to be cross platform. I personally find the language constructs and framework limited. The cross-platform apps tend not to look right on any platform. Use Java if you want to make the multi-platform leap. Java apps seem to crop up mostly as web/internet and client side type apps.

RealBasic ? is a third party RAD (rapid application development) product. I?ve never used it, but heard good things.

Pearl ? non UI unixy string/file manipulation language. Extremely powerful for what it does.

You can also get, for free Cobol, Fortran, Pascal, and other languages! Java and C++ are the most marketable if you want to do this for a living.
 
You mentioned other languages I've never even heard of. But once again which one is the easiest/powerful to learn. So far I'm going for JavaScript. But when TNT fixes their major bug in OS X I'm going with Basic. But then what are Cobol, Fortran, Pascal? Are the easy to learn, and yet powerful? I searched around for a bit but couldn't come up with much.

thanks for your help,

Matt

If this helps even more, I want to create 2-D birds eyeview games. I've created it before in a GUI app, (Windows only) called GameMaker. It's free and good for the begginners. (Easy code, easy interface)
 
Being a Computer Science/CIS student, our classes are javascript -> java -> whatever we choose more or less...it splits off being assembly languages visual basic, or whichever classes we want, C or what not.

I honestly don't know after learning javascript if i'd recommend starting off with it instead of just starting off with java, although I guess it wouldn't hurt. Javascript is quite a bit different than any other language, imo.
 
Cobol, Fortran and Pascal are obsolete languages. TNT BASIC ? Don't know this one. Do you have a link ? Basic in a general view is a good way to get used to some programming techniques and jargon.

You keep asking for the easiest/more powerful language. I'll repeat: Apple is easy, Obj-C is powerful. But both do not perform the same tricks, see upper posts.
 
Easter Toast - calling languages obsolete and dead are dangerous statements :)

You would be amazed in the huge computer industry how much new code is still written in those languages. And the people writing that code will fight you to the death if you bash their languages. I have been on both sides of those battles :)

Let us add ADA and Lisp to the mix!

My point is there are hundreds of languages and each one fits a niche very well. I would not want to write a large shrink-wrapped project in Java nor would I want to write a database-backend client product in C++.

Javascript isn't Java. They share the same name for solely marketing reasons.

mtnbording, what do want to write? That will help us direct you to the right language. If you are looking to develop skills for a career, what type of software are you interested in? Here are just a few examples

Internet: Java, C#
Business: VisualBasic, PowerBuilder
AI:Lisp
General Commercial Apps: C++
Operating Systems: C C++
Multimedia: Director
Database: SQL
 
I want to create 2-D birds eyeview games. I've created games like this before in a GUI app, (Windows only) called GameMaker. It's free and good for the begginners. (Easy code, easy interface)
This is more for fun than anything else. I want to enjoy programming, not hate it.

I hope this helps,
Matt
 
You won't hate it until you are paid to compromise the quality of your product :) The choice of language is so subjective. Personally, I would use Obj-C. You are making a MaxOSX only app. It has a good Object Model. And most importantly the 2D graphics libraries are a joy to use.
 
I opened project builder but I couldn't find any thing listed as "Objective-C" using the assistant. Can someone tell me what a good program to code Objective C with?

thanks,
Matt
 
Remember, Cocoa is a Framework (supporting library and services) written in and for Obj-C. Any Cocoa application will be written in Obj-C.

The developer tool samples include some obj-c/cocoa samples.
 
I think it all depends on whether you want a mac osx language or something you could have a career off of, granted I don't know objective c but I would think that c++ or such would be my choice, as there's plenty of uses for it.

I guess it's all subjective like we've been saying..
 
If you want to do a birdseye view 2D game (like Reckless Drivin' perhaps), I'd suggest starting with something like REALBasic. It's easy to use and straightforward, and it can make some powerful stuff.
 
heh learn Java, I say it again! why? ... its fun.
i'm not sure what jove's trying to prove: java api is limited??

well if he's comparing it to the opensource code available for C/C++, he's right.

But newer projects in SF (sourceforge) are written in Java. So it will grow bigger.

But the cool thing of Java is, as he said: Write Once Run Everywhere, (about "debugging everywhere" i rarely had such a problem)

heh, i bought the Lego Robotics, and programming them in Java is so Much fun!!
 
Originally posted by jove
You won't hate it until you are paid to compromise the quality of your product :)
Click to expand...
This person knows of what they speak ;)
It's a personal choice coupled with the application area you are targetting.
IMO to learn Object Oriented Programming concepts you can't beat Java. Its a highly transferable skill but its not a good choice for client-side development, i.e. games, desktop apps etc. However I suspect it is simpler for beginners to write relatively bug free code than C-based languages.
 
Hi Jove,

Originally posted by jove
Easter Toast - calling languages obsolete and dead are dangerous statements :)

You would be amazed in the huge computer industry how much new code is still written in those languages. And the people writing that code will fight you to the death if you bash their languages. I have been on both sides of those battles :)
Click to expand...

you are right ... I was just telling my personal opinion about the languages I use. Just I don't want to engage a "religion war" about programming languages ... I think that there is the right tool fo the right work an programming languages are powerfull tools.

About Java, I think that it has good performanceces even on real-time application like games, just use ASM or C/C++ for the time-critical section of code (that is very small) and Java for the 90% of the code that controls only the "application-logic".
Instead of write by yourself the complex, optimized, core code in C you can use external library, for examplòe the graphics stuff is handled very well by OpenGL.
To "interface" OpenGL with Java there is a very very good library that is named LWJGL and, yes, it is available for Mac OSX!!!

http://java-game-lib.sourceforge.net/

Salut_
 
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