So I Would Like To Learn Some Coding.

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 3rd, 2013, 9:19 pm

Except the problem is I suck at computers. I seriously have no knowledge about it. None. Nada. Zip. Zero. BUT Atmosphir drew me in because I loved the idea of creating your own game. Well it's gone, so now I'd like to learn how to get into the nitty-gritties of game making; namely, the coding part. There's a computer programming elective at my school but since there's a lot more I wanted to do, I was planning on taking it in two years. They teach C++ and I believe a bit of Java. In the meantime, however, I would like to do some sort of "independent study," if you catch my drift, and learn some on my own. But there are so many languages to choose from, so which one should I do? That's not C++ of course.

YOU'RE ALL TECHNOLOGICALLY ADVANCED YOU PEOPLE TELL ME WHAT TO DO

Post by **Sebastian Lawe** » February 3rd, 2013, 10:09 pm

I'd be more than happy to teach C#.

Swords761 · Post by **Swords761** » February 4th, 2013, 1:24 am

Soccer, you should start by learning more about how to use a computer as an end-user (ie. file navigation, command prompt, the registry). If you can't even download/install a programming language (not saying you can't but hypothetically), let alone figure out how to code/compile/run things, what chance do you have? So my first recommendation if you want to learn how to code is to not actually learn code, but become friends with the computer.

I would recommend learning more about the Windows Control Panel (what stuff is in here, just click around it and see all the options and Google things that look cool but aren't sure about), the Unix Command Line, the Mac Finder (or Windows Explorer), and the Windows Registry (don't actually need to know what is going on in there, I barely do myself, just a basic definition of what its purpose is and maybe how to do a couple things like change the options you see when you right-click, or the send to options, etc. Also fun fact, this is where Atmosphir stored your login information and game preferences!) Google is your mutual friend with the computer; have fun searching and learning about your OS!

When you become more tech-savvy, it'll make more sense (and be much easier, promise) to start learning how to code. Another thing you can do before writing code yourself is understand how HTML, a mark-up language, works. It's not real code, but it's really easy compared to everything else and the premise of writing some text that translates into a graphical website/application is very much the same as programming, the honest to god difference being it's just a language that doesn't really do computations but instead is a bunch of codewords to display/create something. As a fun exercise, try viewing the page source (google how) of this very page! It'll be daunting/confusing for sure, but google some of the <> items you see (ie. <p>, <a href>) and figure out what they do!

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 4th, 2013, 4:33 pm

My thread post was a bit misleading. When I say I have no knowledge of computers, I meant more on the side of troubleshooting stuff; I know where most of my files are located, and if I don't it's a quick Spotlight/Google search away. I do know a bit of HTML as well. It's more advanced computer knowledge that most of you seem to know that I'm basically lost in. I don't really know a good example...Numbers/Excel I really don't know how to use, but if you asked me to do something in Keynote/Powerpoint or Pages/Word then I could. So yeah.

Also, Sebastian, while I was looking at wiki pages for a bunch of different programming languages because...I can

, I came across a source that said C is a great starting language to learn because it influenced so many different languages that the syntax for most of them are the same. Would you happen to know C as well?

Post by **Sebastian Lawe** » February 4th, 2013, 5:00 pm

Soccerstar wrote:My thread post was a bit misleading. When I say I have no knowledge of computers, I meant more
Also, Sebastian, while I was looking at wiki pages for a bunch of different programming languages because...I can , I came across a source that said C is a great starting language to learn because it influenced so many different languages that the syntax for most of them are the same. Would you happen to know C as well?

I would unfortunately die trying to code in C due to you having to do everything (There's no helper methods or intellisense). With C, you have to deal with parsing data in specific memory addresses, and as well freeing up memory once your done using it. If you want to keep track of the word "hello" there's many steps you have to go through. C, being a lower level language will have less things to know, but will require doing many simple functions to complete one task (such as displaying text on screen).

It wouldn't hurt reading up on how C works and how to use its functions, though C# will be much easier in terms of getting things to do what you want.

There's only a handful of things a novice programmer can do with C. You'll also need to know how to parse bytes stored in memory addresses, and write to the correct memory addresses that windows has given your program (I've only known how to parse data for 3 months, even though I've been doing full time programming for 8).

I'll see if I can get myself a C compiler and try stepping you through it. I'm going to assume I can translate some of my C# knowledge to C.

Edit:
You might as well skip and learn C#. I played around with C/C++ for a litte bit, and while it has some of the same functions as C#, everything else isn't comparable. C/C++ has minimal relation to C#, and requires you to always search msdn for documentation. I've been spoiled by the wonders of an intellisense that actually helps you and object oriented programming, despite it being a little slower than C/C++ applications. With C# if I have an idea of what I want to do, I can can do it. With C/C++ if I have an idea of what I want to do, I have to really figure out what I want to do, because C/C++ won't help me get my idea working.

C/C++ has killed me.

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 4th, 2013, 7:31 pm

Okay, that's good to know before I waste my time finding out stuff about C (even though learning C++ will be inevitable as it's part of the computer programming curriculum), thanks. I'll PM you about learning C# -- I do remember attempting learning the language a while back with Kroltan, but I was mainly using a video series on YouTube and wasn't exactly Soccerstar-friendly. So, yeah, thanks

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » February 5th, 2013, 1:51 am

I feel like such a failure, only now am I learning html...

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 5th, 2013, 4:25 pm

When Soccerstar is ahead of you, you know you're doing something wrong.

Just kidding. But seriously, step it up a bit. xD

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » February 5th, 2013, 8:56 pm

Haha Will need to keep that in mind!

Just started a HTML class yesterday and am a little less then a quarter way done with a 18 month long class. I feel as if lots of days shall be spent on Minecraft.

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 5th, 2013, 9:31 pm

18 months? Pffft I don't have the patience for that.

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » February 5th, 2013, 9:41 pm

Soccerstar wrote:18 months? Pffft I don't have the patience for that.

Oh sheesh, I'm loosing my mind! 18 weeks!
Looks like I shall be playing Minecraft for 15 weeks!

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 6th, 2013, 5:23 pm

WOW, because "month" and "week" are so similar...xDDD you scared me there!

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » February 15th, 2013, 12:41 am

Soccerstar wrote:WOW, because "month" and "week" are so similar...xDDD you scared me there!

Haha I don't blame you! Just finished part 34 of 37.

Post by **Sebastian Lawe** » February 15th, 2013, 4:53 pm

So, would anybody be interested in me making a YouTube series on how to code C#?

I probably wont start teaching advanced C# topics anytime soon though. I'll start with the core basics and expand as needed.

Post by **bionicnacho** » February 15th, 2013, 5:42 pm

Sebastian Lawe wrote:So, would anybody be interested in me making a YouTube series on how to code C#?

I probably wont start teaching advanced C# topics anytime soon though. I'll start with the core basics and expand as needed.

It would be a very nice contribution!

Post by **Sebastian Lawe** » February 15th, 2013, 5:56 pm

bionicnacho wrote:It would be a very nice contribution!

I'll teach people how to do it on Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux alike.

Soccerstar · Post by **Soccerstar** » February 15th, 2013, 7:13 pm

Haha, we still haven't Skyped yet. Sorry, I've been pretty busy...I haven't been able to really sit down and concentrate on anything for the past week besides homework.

Post by **Sebastian Lawe** » February 25th, 2013, 5:23 pm

Soccerstar wrote:Haha, we still haven't Skyped yet. Sorry, I've been pretty busy...I haven't been able to really sit down and concentrate on anything for the past week besides homework.

Well, one day you'll have the time

St0l3n_ID · Post by **St0l3n_ID** » March 15th, 2013, 2:43 pm

I created a series of 3 tutorials covering Lua basics. The fourth part will release soon.
All for are made in a way everyone should be able to understand (even non-programmers), made the videos officially for the Heroes of Newerth bot community but as they cover basics they are universal.

Feel free to check the thread i made there (as it serves as a good index):
http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showt ... -Tutorials

Khronologic · Post by **Khronologic** » March 18th, 2013, 9:49 pm

code.org

Pick one from the learn section, and enjoy. This is how I first learned how to code, and goes over the super basics (if you need them, anyway).

But if you want advice on an actual language (even though Codecademy goes over a lot of them), I'd suggest starting to find stuff about Python. Trust me, this is just about the most flexible coding language you can get your hands on, and has a simple syntax and an interactive mode for testing out bits of code. From what I know, Python can also be converted into more powerful languages, such as C++ and JavaScript.

Or, if you want to get directly into coding with C++ and Java, then just start coding some very basic games and build your way up from there.

Hopefully this has been of some use to you!