I thought I would use this fancy new forum section to explore a hobby of mine.

I'm guessing that there are a few decent computer programmers here with this being an online game and all. I was just wondering about your experiences, knowledge extent, etc. I am a noob programmer who only works on it in my spare time, although I hope to get better at it and possibly go into a career for it.

Any comments you people wanna share?

In my undergrad I used to partake in programming contest that was held globally named ACM Programming Contest. I think from programmers point of view that is the most fun time i ever had cause it was just sheer joy of breaking problems and creating results out of the blue. the day we stood in the podium in the national rank the excitement was no less than winning a 100 meter sprint for the univ.

the fun of re-inventing solutions that we never had ideas before was self fulfilling. that was the golden age of learning programming concepts. everything was fresh and flamboyantly flavored.

like all the professions a programmers life also demands certain level of monotonicity, but the best part is u always are moving forward with the state of the art tech from the next world. you wont have that in any other professions. stability is demanded but the tools and apparatus that a programmer uses the novelty that it presents is great.

learning programming can be tedious but the first step is always the hardest... i know i didnt understand a simple bubble sort when i first started was funny as hell when i figured why i needed to sort some random numbers hehe..

start with a basic language if u really wanna get in the core of programming but if u are here to have fun and just wanna try out some tools or high level manipulations of some hardware then any of the Object Oriented Language is ok most popular obviously is VB now VB.Net. I started with c so i am a core c guy hence C#.Net is my language when it comes to high level languages.

best u can really do is if u can use the pc input/output features from programming language. in this way ur program really comes out of the world of bits and bytes to the measurable tactile reality.

do what ever just know one thing there is no wrong doing in programming world. if u make something happen that happened cause it was meant to happen and thats why it exists. hence there is no boundary what u can do.

Cheers and have fun.

PS: try hacking zorg's pc i will send 10 rubies hehehe jk

Programming ***** and is terrible to deal with. That's all I have to say about that.

I have experience in many programming languages, however I would rather deal with the networking aspect of computers anymore

Programming... First, I'll say that I have almost zero experience with it. However, I love how logical and structured it is. There's nothing quite like working in an environment where things do exactly what you tell them to do: no more and no less.

I personally love programming, sure it can be extremely annoying when you get a bug you just can't find and it takes hours to trawl through hundreds of lines of code and setting breakpoints every 30 seconds. But once you have something you yourself created that works perfectly, it gives you a sense of satisfaction. Programming is a world where you can create anything if you have the knowledge.

My job involves me working daily with VB, VBA and SQL all of which are quite easy languages to master if you put your mind to it. I've also learned self learned JASS over the last 4 or 5 years, which is not a very well known language since it was created by Blizzard for their Warcraft series, I use it for the many mods and maps I make for the game. It's name stands for Just Another Scripting Syntax, which you will probably find amusing if you are an avid modder of this series.

But yeah, over all programming is very fun if frustrating at times and is a very good hobby or career choice for someone who thinks logically and has a great creative imagination.

Maul64 wrote:...things do exactly what you tell them to do: no more and no less.

In a perfect world, anyway

As for the rest: like I said, I'm a newb programmer. I'm working through Java right now (mainly on my own with the help of this book I found) and once I can do that respectably I hope to begin exploring other languages (C, VB, etc.). I'll agree with Istal and say the monotony and bug-fixing suck, but it's worth it when things finally fall into place.

How does one begin a career in programing?

get a degree in programming languages. can be any thing from diploma to honors to a simple course or certification. that is the base then u start job hunting.

Ahh, I might be a little young yet then.