I first took an intro class for a widely-used language, to get 'oriented'. I didn't have access to that language then, so tried others with similar syntax. To l

I first took an intro class for a widely-used language, to get 'oriented'. I didn't have access to that language then, so tried others with similar syntax. To learn one better, I modified other people's programs to add desired features. Then I started aiming my programs at hardware ... where reaching the goal is easy to verify! and the value of optimizing can easily be tested. By then I knew enough to tell the difference between a kludge and art, and read up on that.