[lug] First Programming Language

[Alan Robertson]

I certainly agree that Javascript is one of the most universally used languages - but it's much harder to learn and use correctly than Python. I'm glad I've not run into the bad Python that Michael has, but I've certainly seen pretty awful Javascript - nearly everywhere on the front end. And to use it on the front end, knowing the framework is more important than the language - and the framework battles makes the Wild West look tame... Node.js is much cleaner and clearer - if you need asynchronous, event-driven programming. That's a fairly advanced topic.

My recommendation would be Python and Flask. Flask is _embarrassingly_ easy.

If she decides to go into programming after trying it, then she'll need to learn lots of languages.

For a first program, I'd go for the easiest win possible, then let her see if she likes it. If she doesn't like the easiest program and method, she won't like the rest of them ;-).

-- 
  Alan Robertson
  alanr at unix.sh

On Wed, Jan 3, 2018, at 9:57 PM, Michael J. Hammel wrote:
> On Wed, 2018-01-03 at 19:29 -0700, Steve Sullivan wrote:
> > My daughter wants to learn her first programming language.
> 
> If she doesn't really care about programming in the long term then
> Python is fine.  
> 
> If, however, she wants to expand on what she learns with this project
> then use Javascript with nodejs.  
> 
> Python has apparently raised a generation of really bad programmers who
> write unmaintainable code. It's structure is less like many other more
> useful languages than Javascript and nodejs can show her what real
> object orientation looks like.  And there are really nice frameworks to
> base her web interface (and backend) on such as Express and Restify. 
> Most important:  nodejs and Javascript will introduce her to the most
> useful data format for the web (and thus, business): JSON.  Python can
> do JSON, but JSON is native to the Javascript language.
> -- 
> Michael J. Hammel <mjhammel at graphics-muse.org>
> _______________________________________________
> Web Page:  http://lug.boulder.co.us
> Mailing List: http://lists.lug.boulder.co.us/mailman/listinfo/lug
> Join us on IRC: irc.hackingsociety.org port=6667 channel=#hackingsociety