Build something with it. More specifically, need to build something with it. I learned C by writing a video game using it (so far in the past that it was the

Build something with it. More specifically, need to build something with it. I learned C by writing a video game using it (so far in the past that it was the only real option for games). I learned VB by taking a job at a shop that used it, then C# when that shop migrated to .NET. I learned Ruby because that was the best maintained AWS library back in 2006, and my stuff was failing due to things their C# libs couldn't yet fix. I learned Python by taking a job building a site with Google AppEngine back when Django was its framework of choice. I recently (re-)learned Java by taking a contract gig at a java shop. It helps if there is some code already written, so that you can see what things are supposed to look like and get a feel for how things work in that language. I find that I can drop in to a new codebase in an unfamiliar language and make meaningful contributions on day one, if there are bugs that need fixing or simple features that need tacking on. Talking with other devs, it sounds like my experience is pretty typical. A straw poll showed that nearly half the devs on that Java gig were C# guys who either had never used the language or hadn't touched it in years. We all got bit by (myString == "whatever") never returning true at least once, but for the most part it's just computer programming. Once you know how to do that, the language itself isn't too important.