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Starting with Go you could end up not bothering with C/C++.
by jussij 13y ago
Starting with Go you could end up not bothering with C/C++.
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoBut why is that? If you're goal is to be a very knowledgeable and proficient programmer, I find not knowing C/C++ at all to be a lot hard to take seriously.
- jussij 13y agoBecause some languages are more enjoyable to code than others. For example, I learnt C before C++ and found coding in C++ was more enjoyable than coding in C. Since then I've been doing a lot of C# coding and I find that much nicer than coding in C++. From what I've seen of Go it's seems quite a nice language. So by getting proficient in Go it might actually be too frustrating to then try and start coding in C/C++.
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoSo this attitude I find hard to take seriously if your goal is to become a well versed, proficient programmer.
- jussij 13y agoI've written a commercial programmer's editor that consisting of about 200,000 lines of C/C++ code. http://www.zeusedit.com http://www.zeusedit.com Now I don't consider myself an expert in C/C++ but after writing and debugging that many lines of C/C++ code I do consider myself proficient. But that doesn't change the fact that when it comes to languages, I find that C# is easier to work with than C++. But that is just my opinion.
- eliasmacpherson 13y agowow, how long have you been writing that editor for?
- jussij 13y agoThat editor evolved over 15 years (Win16, Win32, Win95, Win NT, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7). But there was one full re-write in that time.
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoThat's nice but I don't see how this is a serious attack on what I claimed. My claim is simple: promoting ignorance is bad.
- sambeau 13y agoYou are mistaking 'programmer' with 'computing scientist'. The goal of a programmer should be to write great programs. Sometimes that may require discovering new paradigms. Mostly it involves picking up a trusted tool and getting on with it. Studying programming languages themselves may make you a more knowledgeable programmer but will not necessarily make you a better programmer. To become a better programmer you simply have to write better programs.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoYes, we are not talking about some random programming language of a textbook like Ada or Algol. Virtually any system you actually interact with in the real world has a very high probability that it was built in C. At one point, it was nearly a lingua franca. I do not argue it is the greatest language or any box you're trying to put me in. I argue that a proficient programmer with the goal of being well versed in programming (not just "computer science" as you dismissively wrote) should be knowledgeable of C and C++ or at least desire to be and not have some strange attitude of promoting it's ignorance ...
- coldtea 13y agoWhat does programming in C++ or whatever has to to with being a "well versed, proficient programmer"? Who said you have to learn every junk language under the sun?
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoI don't really see what the downvotes are about, it seems like anti-intellectualism. My thesis is that if you are wholly ignorant of C and C++, you have a large gap in your knowledge of programming. To wit, you will be unable to understand any systems programming out there; for better or worse that's how it is. This is not to say you are an idiot or something if you don't know C, that is not what is being argued. But this attitude of "don't learn C" is just kind of ignorant to me. I find the backlash against my view sort of ridiculous to see on "Hacker News." This is really not that controversial.
- enneff 13y agoI think you got down-voted because you were speaking in absolutes, rather than being even-handed. If you had said what you just said then—instead of blurting out a one-liner—you would have been more well-received.