Experienced Programmer, novice at Java

[CuddlyKittens11]

Hey there, though I should make a formal introduction.

My name is CuddlyKittens11. I'm a pretty experienced programmer, have been doing this stuff for four years. I have a knowledge of Blitz BASIC, DarkBASIC Pro, Python, Pearl, C, C++, PHP, XHTML, XML, CSS, and a few other I can't remember. I'm still kind of new to Java.

I also have great experience with MySQL and DarkGDK (DarkBASIC Pro for C++).

I'm still in high school, but I'm almost done with my Senior year and am going to be heading to the Rochester Institute of Technology for their IGM program.

What I want to do with my programming is make video games. Though I haven't played them as much as I should for what I'm going to, I really enjoy (at least trying to) designing and programming them.

My other interests include Karate, Guitar, Music (Foo Fighters, Smashing Pumpkins, The Killers, The Goo Goo Dolls).

Well, Hi.

P.S. when do I start getting Rep power?

[sunde887]

Welcome, I believe rep power is earned when people rep up your helpful posts. Fubar or other mods can probably give more details about the specifics.

Four years experience and still in high school, that's impressive. I'm glad you found something that interested you at such a young age. I wish I had gotten interested in high school. I look forward to helping you learn the difference about java whenever possible.

[CuddlyKittens11]

Welcome, I believe rep power is earned when people rep up your helpful posts. Fubar or other mods can probably give more details about the specifics.

Four years experience and still in high school, that's impressive. I'm glad you found something that interested you at such a young age. I wish I had gotten interested in high school. I look forward to helping you learn the difference about java whenever possible.

I though rep power must have been based around post count (I've been on other vBull powered forums and that's how they do it.)

Well, I actually started in Middle School. In sixth grade, I think I tried to learn HTML, for like a day or two, didn't work out well, lol. I started to really half way through 8th grade. My brother bought a book called "3D Game Programming For Teens." He read about a fourth of the book, got stuck and got frustrated and never picked it up again. I took the book when he wasn't using it and read it myself, got to finish it. I still have the book on my bookshelf, it's pretty much mine now. :D

[sunde887]

It could possibly be post based as well. I think I got to rep power 2 at post #1000. I still don't know the exact details, hopefully one of the mods can come by and tell us the exact details.

What kind of projects have you done to learn c++? I am reading a few books about it right now, and having some good things to work on would be great.

Like I said, I wish I had gotten interested at such a young age. I have only been reading about java for about 4-5 months now, and I'm only just going to college for it next semester.

[CuddlyKittens11]

Hehe, I wish I started to program when I was younger as well.

Well, with C++, for years, I've always tried to make a video game, just never really had any solid idea, well until this one last year, I've been working on and off with, like I get to work on it when I have a free day once a month. But I don't have any good final projects I'd like to showcase. Most of the time, I'm just trying to learn an API, or reading a C++, to learn techniques and other crap.

[sunde887]

Ah, alright, ya, I have done some fairly small java projects, but a lot of time is spent reading multiple books. Know of any good c++ forums that are similar to this one? The only one I have found is c programming.com.

[CuddlyKittens11]

THIS.
It's a great straight forward explanation to C++ and concepts. Though it says "Game Programming," you're going to be stuck in the command line, but the important thing is that it teaches you C++.

And there there is this one as well. It's a GREAT book, it covers some different stuff that the first, and much more in depth on OOP.

What I did was read all of the first, and read chapters 8-12 of the second. It will give you an outstanding knowledge on C++.

But if you only could buy one, get the first. The second used to be available online for free on MSDN, but their contract expired with the publisher (I've got a hard copy with spiral binding).

[sunde887]

Money is not a huge problem for me, as far as books go. Currently I am reading accelerated c++(about 200 pages in atm), practical c++ programming(on page 400), and I just got c++ primer in the mail the other day.

I'll have to check these books out. I actually like using command line compiling, but I am retarded with installing compilers and such. I had mingw which was installed with Code::blocks, it allowed me to compile source fine, but once I got into headers it would cause errors. I have just decided to move onto IDE's in c++(using code::blocks).

Im getting my command line experience using java and notepad++.

[CuddlyKittens11]

Use Linux, it's a great way to get command line experience.

If you're new to Linux, just use Ubuntu, here is the simple way to install it.

It comes pre-built with GCC, but not G++, you'll need to install it via the Sypnatic Package Manager, or do a "sudo apt-get install g++" in the command line.

You can also practice your command line editing, using "vi."

[sunde887]

Ya, I have ubuntu and windows 7 dual booted on my laptop, I always want to try to learn linux better but I am still very new to it. I have problems getting the drivers for my net card working on linux so I always end up using windows instead. Perhaps I wll have to start practicing on ubuntu more. What's different about gcc and g++? Vi is similar to emacs, correct? I don't have much experience with either, however; I just started reading a little tutorial for an emacs like editor that I downloaded with Scheme.

[CuddlyKittens11]

What version of Ubuntu are you using, and whats your Network card manufacturer?

The "gcc" command is the C compiler part of the GCC, the "g++" is the C++ compiler part of the GCC.

Also about vi and emacs, hell no they are similar.

[sunde887]

I believe it's ubuntu 10.10. And the netcard is Realtek RTL8188CE, I had a thread on the ubuntu forums and I was suggested to download the updated drivers and it still didn't work. The computer doesn't recognize the netcard.

[CuddlyKittens11]

That's sad :(

[sunde887]

Thanks for the help, and i hope you enjoy it here.

[JosAH]

And there there is this one as well. It's a GREAT book, it covers some different stuff that the first, and much more in depth on OOP.

Herbert Schildt's books, all of them, belong in the fire place; he played that trick with C, Java, C++ and probably a few other languages; those books are full of errors and his wise-men advice is totally wrong most of the time. He even tried to 'annotate' the ISO C reference and completely goofed; he is an amateur. Read 'the C++ Programming Language' written by its creator Bjarne Stroustrup instead if you want to have a solid knowledge about the language but please forget about that Herbert Schilldt; he's a nono and he's only in it for the money. His books are a waste of trees.

kind regards,

Jos

[sunde887]

Thanks for the advice. I was considering picking up the reference by Bjarne after reading through the three I named(accelerated c++, c++ primer, and practical c++). I am also considering buying bjarnes intro to c++ book.

Also, great recommendation on sicp, I started reading it online and getting used to the Edwin editor they have. It's definitely an interesting read but I sense it will take a lot of reading to truly understand the topics thoroughly.

[JosAH]

Thanks for the advice. I was considering picking up the reference by Bjarne after reading through the three I named(accelerated c++, c++ primer, and practical c++). I am also considering buying bjarnes intro to c++ book.

Also, great recommendation on sicp, I started reading it online and getting used to the Edwin editor they have. It's definitely an interesting read but I sense it will take a lot of reading to truly understand the topics thoroughly.

It still surprises me how Bjarne had to jump through hoops (and still does) to keep that backward compatibility with C. The value semantics of C are killing (e.g. collection needing to make a copy of the thing you want to stick into it is ludicrous imho); in a way I like Objective C much better; if you dig into that language you'll see how much Gosling has stole^H^H^H^H^Hborrowed from that language when he created Java.

About that sicp book: it took me a year or so to completely understand what it was all about (and I had finished my math studies for more than a decade already). If you really want to go into the 'mechanics' of Lisp, go to an antique shop and try to find the old Lisp 1.5 primer; it's amazing what was done already in 1959 ...

kind regards,

Jos