Looking to Start Programming as a Hobby

[Doirdyn]

Software Development, Programming, whatever people decide to call it now. I want to start learning as a hobby without formal education (mainly because I can't afford to go into another field).

I'm in my last semester to becoming a network engineer and I was hoping someone would have advice on a place to start. As far as application goes, I want to create games.

(Apologies if this is in the wrong section, wasn't sure where to stick it.)

[taekvideo]

There are several languages that are easy to start in.. different variations of BASIC all work well.
For a first "real" programming language I'd recommend java using the netbeans IDE (good debugger).

[Doirdyn]

All I understood from that was Java and BASIC. Any kind of online guide, etc. would be appreciated.

[Ashalah]

Well, major games like WoW are written in C++, so that's not a bad place to start. The learning curve for programming is a bit steep, but hang in there; once you get the ball rolling it becomes much easier.

You don't even have to learn low level stuff like Direct3D off the bat, you can use readily available engines like http://www.ogre3d.org/
It's much more encouraging to see something come to life on your screen than to deal with low level details for weeks/months.

Here are some resources:

http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudi...al-cpp-express
Free C++ IDE and compiler from Microsoft.

http://www.gamedev.net
Forums and articles for hobbyist and indie game developers.

http://stackoverflow.com/
Excellent Q&A site.

You might also want to buy a C++ book or something like that. Personally I hate books, but people tend to recommend them.
Oh and, uh, little tip: there are a lot of WoW-like nutjobs, doomsayers etc. on the internet, take programming advice with a grain of salt.

/edit:
If you just want to get your feet wet really quick, I suggest Python. Download it and check out some tutorials here:
http://python.org/
Not much hope in making games with it though, it's horribly slow. Only good for making like 2D games, which is not a bad start.

[rijn dael]

Just offhand, it depends what you want to actually do -

If you want to create fairly simple games, there are premade tools like 'gamemaker' that will do semi-reasonable things. They aren't so much programming as defining events, but they are worth having a look at, and you will pick up a bit of understanding there.

An intermediate step would be flash, or java games for embedding in browsers, phones and the like.

If you want to program in a 'real' programming language - ie, the sort of thing wow, counterstrike and those sorts of games are written in, you are looking for things more like C/C++, and some other languages (I believe EVE online is written in stackless python?) - in any case, you can google up decent tuturials which will get you started in any of those - I would suggest you might want to try something friendlier first - say java rather than C++ - but it depends on your willingness to hit your head against the wall to get through

HTH.

[Doirdyn]

Thanks to the both of you, I will definitely check those resources out.

Another thought: which languages would be best for reaching the most platforms? I heard some open-source languages were more superior and powerful to things such as C.

[taekvideo]

An open-source language?

edit: java is great for reaching a lot of platforms

[ispano]

lol @ open-source language

[Doirdyn]

lol @ open-source language

Post thoughts? I'm literally clueless on the subject

[taekvideo]

Post thoughts? I'm literally clueless on the subject

oh do you mean scripting languages?

[ispano]

While the terms open source and programming language are related, they aren't in the way you stated them. Open source just means you provide said code and allow others to see and modify it. Closed or open, it's still written with a language.

[Deleted]

Post thoughts? I'm literally clueless on the subject

I'm quite sure you can learn and use all languages without any risk.

I would recommend something simple to start with, such as Ruby, Python or Pearl. Since you're into network stuff, CSS, HTML, php or java would be quite useful. There are free guides out there, a simple google search should do the trick.

[ispano]

While the terms open source and programming language are related, they aren't in the way you stated them. Open source just means you provide said code and allow others to see and modify it. Closed or open, it's still written with a language.ie t

ie the language itself isn't closed or open, just the program someone writes may or may not be open.

[Dawon]

If you want game programming in particular, I'd recommend you to download Visual Studio (there is some free:ish kinda version) and Microsoft XNA 4.0. XNA is the platform they use for making e.g. Xbox Arcade games and such. It's an insanely easy API and it basically takes you 1-2 tutorial/testprograms to get a screen opened, a "sprite" loaded and an idea of how to move it around with arrowkeys or something like that.

Plus the development is in C# which isn't a bad thing as that's a pretty established language now that more or less takes the best from Java and C++ and combine them into one language.

So, go XNA to learn the basics of game programming, you won't get an easier start.

[Ashalah]

Another thought: which languages would be best for reaching the most platforms? I heard some open-source languages were more superior and powerful to things such as C.

My honest advice is to not worry about crossplatform yet, it's a messy business. Since most of the stuff you'll be making for a while will be thrown away, and the issue of crossplatform is in boring shitty details, it will only slow you down and frustrate you.

If you wanna see what programming is like and maybe make a simple 2D game, definitely go Python, since C++ tends to bite new programmers in the arse. I've seen new C++ programmers make really obscure and weird mistakes that even for me are hard to track down.

You might also need an editor, like http://notepad-plus-plus.org/

/edit:
Yep, would also give a big thumbs up to XNA like Dawon recommended. You can get it for free from Microsoft and it works for Windows PC too. I tried it at about v2.0 and its pretty good. C# (which is unrelated to C or C++) is an easy language to learn and quite good. A lot of MS's links and website structure changes like every few months, so I don't have a direct link for this one unfortunately.

[Deleted]

I'm quite sure you can learn and use all languages without any risk.

I would recommend something simple to start with, such as Ruby, Python or Pearl. Since you're into network stuff, CSS, HTML, php or java would be quite useful. There are free guides out there, a simple google search should do the trick.

I don't really think CSS, HTML or PHP would be any good for learning "network stuff".

CSS is for determining the looks of an (X)HTML document.
HTML is a markup language (it's not programming, you're just defining the layout of a document).
PHP is mostly used for server-side web programming.

If anything I'd recommend Python and Perl (especially Python, Perl is going the way of the dodo these days). They are both extremely powerful languages and for a beginner they won't bog you down with a lot of boilerplate code.

[Deleted]

Start with C, then switch to C++.

http://www.bloodshed.net/devcpp.html
or you can always torrent Visual Studio.

Why C and C++? Dunno, i use OpenGL and SDL API's so they are "good" combo. Ofc you can use JOGL for Java, but meh.
Java sounds good for multiplatform, yep? But i really doubt you will be making something for non windows.

Things you should learn:
If's, for's, while's
arrays
structures
functions (and procedures)
POINTERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
dynamic memory

classes(in C++)
and then the rest

These languages are good for raising understanding of how things work.