I don't find this very accurate. When I started programming, I didn't read many books, didn't know patterns and all that. I just did whatever was necessary to g

I don't find this very accurate. When I started programming, I didn't read many books, didn't know patterns and all that. I just did whatever was necessary to get the result I wanted. Between then and now, I've learnt a lot of theory, and I think the key to good programming is just to keep applying what you learned to your software and to keep evolving. Microsoft Languages and Frameworks don't suck. They made design decisions based off a lot of legacy stuff - they didn't have the luxury of being able to create a brand new SDK. The attempt they made (.NET) turned out pretty alright. The .NET languages and frameworks are pretty good and consistent. Python is a good short start, equivalent to learning to develop with C on the console, but once you graduate this level, it becomes horribly limited. Making a GUI with python is a convoluted and painful process. So python may be suitable at the start, but one should quickly graduate into a native SDK for the platform you are working in. And I don't think either of the two mobile SDKs is really well suited for beginners. There is a lot of non-language things to take care off when developing for mobile. I personally think the best programming way is : C on the console -> .NET or Java. Those will give you a good grasp about what most programming is about and then you can specialise in whatever you want to do.