C++: this got me into computers Mumps: didn't ruin my life, just a year of it VB6: wow you could get a lot of pretty productive stuff done quickly Matlab: Th

C++: this got me into computers Mumps: didn't ruin my life, just a year of it VB6: wow you could get a lot of pretty productive stuff done quickly Matlab: This is how math on a computer should be written. R: Convinced me there is nothing better than a long lived environment with repl which preserves state. In fact, this is how all code should be written. Also demonstrates open source and provide the best software at least in technical niches. Java: convinced me garbage collection is good and made me a much better typist. Ruby: wow you can get a lot of work done quickly -- at least in dev time. Scala: this is what java should be