learn to program

8 ideal languages ​​to learn to program from scratch

Many people believe that a programming language only serves to program. It is a big mistake. Learning a language prepares you to solve the problems of daily life. It will not only help you in your day to day, but you can even make a living from it.

Even at the risk of sinning immodestly, let us tell you one of the most important things you are going to hear today: learning to program is not just computer science; it is also a life lesson. Therefore, we have compiled these programming languages to learn how to program from scratch.

A programming language is used to create applications, right. You can design your own apps and, if you are good, even make it your profession and earn a lot of money with it.

But it is a mistake to believe that a computer language only serves that purpose. On the contrary, it can also help you solve many problems of everyday life. In fact, you can learn one and never use it to program, and yet still make a profit. Intrigued?

First of all, upskilling yourself on programming serves to understand computing and mobiles. If you know how to program, you will understand the importance of RAM memory or the power of the processor in a mobile phone in specific situations, you will know how viruses act, why the firmware must be installed in a certain way, what an operating system provides, and other mechanisms of the technology.

But also programming helps you in your daily life. An application is nothing more than the solution to a problem or challenge. You have a task, be it sorting some data, creating a tool to edit a photo, or moving a character around the screen. And a programming language teaches you how to solve that problem. You learn to divide the task into smaller subtasks that can be more easily handled, and link them together to find the solution.

Programming teaches you to solve life’s big problems by breaking them down into smaller problems you can handle, and by learning to deal with them logically and methodically.

If we have convinced you, take a look at these 8 programming languages that are easy to learn, enjoyable, and very practical.

Scratch

Scratch is a programming language developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), for children to learn the concepts of programming. But it is so fun and practical that many adults use it. It is ideal to start, if you have no prior computer knowledge. In recent weeks, its use has exploded, to the point of entering the TOP 20 worldwide of the TIOBE list.

Scratch is a block language. This means that commands, actions, and constraints are small blocks that you link together, like Lego blocks, to create programs.

It’s easy to understand, you can do a lot of cool things, even apps that work on your own, and there’s plenty of documentation and online courses to learn. And all the tools are free.

You can also encourage your children (if you have them) to learn together.

Start by taking a look at the official Scratch page. Here you can download the tools to get started, and the manuals and courses. There are also thousands of user-created applications, so you can see what can be done.

There is also a simplified version for children between 5 and 7 years old, called ScratchJr.

Although Scratch is not a professional language, it is perfect to create your first apps, and to learn the programming concepts that will later be very useful in other more advanced languages.

Another similar, but more advanced option is Tynker.

Python

Python is a programming language developed in the 1980s by the Dutch programmer Guido van Rossum. Although it is more than 30 years old, it is the language that has grown the most in recent years, because it has been discovered that it is ideal for creating artificial intelligence applications, which are increasingly in demand.

The great advantage of Python is that it was developed from scratch to make it easy to understand. Its commands and commands are common words, and its code (list of commands that make up a program) looks like phrases, so it can almost be read as text:

With commands as simple as Print, you print text on the screen. If you have a condition, for example If the user has accumulated 4 credits do this, and if  not  do this another . Direct English words like If or else are used.

Python is easy to learn and easy to read, so you can easily create applications and easily follow the code flow to find or improve bugs. Even if the program was not written by you.

It is the most widely used language in finance, or when calculations and formulas have to be applied, or interfaces have to be developed. Against it, it is a bit slow when it comes to executing tasks, compared to other languages.

And as we have said, it turns out that it adapts very well to the needs of a type of artificial intelligence called machine learning or machine learning, so today it is in great demand:

Not only will it be easy for you to understand, but you can also earn a living if you decide to learn it thoroughly.

Companies like Google or NASA use Python  in some of their projects. It is also the base language of platforms such as Pinterest, Instagram and YouTube.

However, it does not work to create mobile applications or web applications, so keep that in mind.

You can learn more about Python on its official website.

Code Studio

Code.org is a non-profit organization funded by Amazon, Facebook, Google, the Infosys Foundation, Microsoft and dozens of companies, which aims to facilitate the teaching of programming in all schools in the world, using free resources and open source software.

It is not a language in itself, but a collection of courses and tools to learn the concepts of computing and programming at the school level. But since all the resources are free and open to everyone, anyone can take advantage of them.

Code Studio, its educational platform, uses different visual languages, some of them own as CS, to teach programming. After completing a series of online courses for different ages, you can access more advanced courses in Javascript, C, Python, and other professional languages.

It has plenty of resources and abundant supporting documentation. With Code Studio more than 79 million applications have been created, and accumulates more than 49 million users.

If you want to know more, take a look or download the courses on the Code.org website

Lua

Lua is a programming language developed in Brazil. It is designed for children and beginners to learn programming in a simple way.

It is widely used in the creation of games for iOS and Android. Angry Birds, World of Warcraft or Roblox use Lua. It is one of the fastest scripting based languages out there.

It has a simple syntax that is reminiscent of Python or Ruby, and there is abundant documentation.

If you like video games, it is a good language to start.

Download the Lua 5.1 reference manual access the official website of Lua.

Blockly

Blockly is Google’s answer to Scratch. It is a very similar block-based language.

One of the advantages that Blockly has is that you create the applications in a simple way using blocks that hook each other, visual. But Blockly is in charge of automatically translating these blocks into one of these languages (the one you want) …

  • JavaScript
  • Python
  • PHP
  • Lua
  • Dart

This way if you create a game or an app in Blocky you will get the code in those languages, even if you don’t know them, and you will be able to use it wherever you need a program in JavaScript, PHP, etc.

It is a basic language that does not allow you to do too complex things, but it serves to learn the fundamentals of programming.  Recommended from 10 years.

Start learning Blockly on its official website.

Alice

Although it is an easy-to-learn object-oriented programming language, Alice is primarily used as a tool for creating 3D games and animations.

It is attractive for beginners (especially for children) because it allows to design very attractive  creations in a simple way , since it includes things like modeling scenes, placing cameras and defining the animation of the characters, using blocks.

It is a bit slow and the creations do not work independently (you need an Alice interpreter to use them), but it is easy to learn and encourages you to keep insisting on programming, as the practical lessons are so much fun.

It also teaches many concepts that are later applied in more complex languages, such as C ++.

Access Alice’s official website.

Ruby

Like Python, Ruby is a people-focused language, not hardware. It was designed in the 90s by the Japanese programmer Yukihiro Matsumoto, with the sole objective that it was easy to learn, and to understand.

You can read a program written in Ruby even if you don’t know the language. Take a look at this code in Ruby. By simply reading what is written, it is possible to guess what it does:

We see a list of cities, and another with cities visited. The code writes the message “I still need to visit the following cities”, and shows the remaining cities to visit with a simple subtraction of two objects: cities – visited.

It is a simple language to learn but powerful. And you can create all kinds of applications. It is also among the 15 most used in the world.

You can download all the tools on Ruby’s official website. For starters, nothing beats this 20 minute Ruby tutorial.

If you want to save time, you can try Ruby on Rails, a series of previously created Ruby-based tools that are used to create web pages in a simple way. But you will need HTML knowledge.

Java

Java is not the first language you should learn, because its syntax is complicated. But it is a good choice if you have already learned some of those mentioned here and master programming.

It is the most used programming language in the world. It has the advantage that it is used practically for everything, from web applications to computer programs, Android apps, games, etc. Minecraft, for example, has been created in Java.

It should not be confused with Javascript, which is a completely different language, also very popular. Javascript is a language that works in the browser, simple and easy to use, but it only serves to create applications for web pages, and requires knowing other languages with HTML and PHP.

Java is a stable and secure language, and there is a lot of documentation. It is an object-oriented language, a simpler and more intuitive way of programming where you work with entities that make a function and handle some data. It is about relating those entities, according to the data, to create the programs.

If you learn Java you will learn the fundamentals of other languages, so later it will be easier for you to learn the C language, for example. With the great advantage that it works practically for everything, and has infinity of professional applications, if you learn to master it. Google or eBay use Java in many of their applications.

Being so popular, there are tons of free Java tutorials and courses. If you are interested, visit the official Java website.

You may also like http://3diesel.com/

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.