programming is it easy?

is it easy to learn i tried c++ as an online course in school and totally got lost after a few weeks i just couldn't seem to make basic stuff work so any tips? is computer programming or computer science just not for everyone?

and is it easy to find freelancing jobs enough to live on?

It's not so easy for everyone But if you know good Programming you can do Freelancing work and earn Good number of amount.

First thing you need is to learn the logic behind the programming. You need analytical skills. When you'll learn one programming language, for instance c++, then its pretty easy to learn the others.
If you are skilled then you could live from freelancing easily.

Never give up! ;-).

Learning programming language is not hard at all, you can teach even a monkey. But writing high quality code needs a lot of dedication and focus. To be honest, to code you need to born as good developer

Was actually thinking about this too, I'd love to learn how to do all that stuff but it seems so complicated and timely.

OP develop your logic building. C#, vb.net, java, PHP all can be mastered in like a month or 2. Just learn one program for start. Go with c++ only but as a beginner write the program on a page and dry-run. It means do not sit on pc directly. Write on paper and run it yourself to see how it executes.

Prepare flow charts and all to learn how logic building is done. Syntax can be memorized in a day or two. It's all practice, practice and don't give up.

Also don't learn to make money. It never leads anywhere.

Sure it's easy... easy enough for me to pay other people to do it.

jamesvick said:

OP develop your logic building. C#, vb.net, java, PHP all can be mastered in like a month or 2. Just learn one program for start. Go with c++ only but as a beginner write the program on a page and dry-run. It means do not sit on pc directly. Write on paper and run it yourself to see how it executes.

Prepare flow charts and all to learn how logic building is done. Syntax can be memorized in a day or two. It's all practice, practice and don't give up.

Also don't learn to make money. It never leads anywhere.

Click to expand...

Lol at mastering a language in a month or two. Mastering a language takes many, many, many years. OP if you're asking, then you're not up for it. Don't ask, just work. It takes years, just like it takes years to become good at everything else. You don't become the next Jimi Hendrix in a month or two, neither do you become the next Billy Joel in a month or two. Everything takes time, you're just wasting it by asking.

I personally think you ought to start with Java, as you will be forced to learn object-oriented programming (OOP), whereas in C++, OOP is possible, but if you teach yourself, you will likely learn C-style coding, which means all the code and functions are in one file and there are no objects.

Before you even write a program, even if the program is given to you online, you need to perform textual analysis on the program. You need to:

• Write down a description of your program, incorporating class names/functions/attributes into it so you can see how they interact
• Write down each class, its attributes, and its functions so you can get a written-out structure
• Identify the program users and their abilities in the program
• Create a use-case diagram that identifies each user and creates a visual diagram of their abilities (look up the guidelines for this)
• Create a UML diagram of all your classes/etc. for a visual structure (look up the guidelines for UML)

This will help you get a better understanding of your program, plus have a variety of references at all times to guide you through the coding process.

BlueZero said:

When you'll learn one programming language, for instance c++, then its pretty easy to learn the others.

Click to expand...

Once you've learned 10+ it's easy to learn others. With 1? Not even close.

If you learn C++ it'll be easy to learn C, Java and C#.

Perl, Python and Ruby not so much. It won't be hard to learn the big loosely typed languages, but it won't be "easy" either.

Javascript/php etc will be easy. They aren't difficult languages even for a non-programmer. They're bad first languages if you want to become a good programmer though.


Most of the imperative languages will be easy coming from C++ and the imperative OO languages will be even easier. Ruby is drastically different from C++ though and even being a pure OO language it wouldn't be a walk in the park. Python might seem more comfortable for a C++ programmer.

The declarative languages are an entirely different proposition. You could have 20 years C++ experience and find the declarative languages as hard as a clever non-programmer who has less rigid thought patterns.

It's only once you know at least 10 languages that you'll start to find new languages easy since it's likely every language you'll encounter is similar to at least one you know.

The main requirement for being a good programmer is not having rigid thought patterns. It's a very creative field and the creative programmer will be more effective than the rigid knowledgeable programmer for most things other than repetitive systems/web type programming.



*EDIT* ---------- DEFINITIONS ---------------

So there's no confusions all languages basically fall under one of 2 main types

Imperative languages and Declarative languages

Imperative languages are where you solve a problem by programming the computer to go through the tasks in the algorithm to solve it. Ie, you imperatively tell it each step. C, C++, Java, Perl, Ruby, Python, PHP, Javascript, VB and most languages you'll come across are imperative.

Declarative languages are where you declare the solution you want and the computer finds the answers. We don't have 100% declarative languages yet. Functional languages are a subset of declarative where you are dealing with recursive functions. Ie functions modify the input and return output. In procedural programming you can have a function that just does something on the side not related to the main input/output, so functional programming differs from procedural even though they both use functions.

Regular expressions are an example of a pure declarative statement. You tell the computer exactly what you want. Ie.

\w{7}\d{3}\s+\w+ --- This will match 7 "word" characters followed immediately by 3 digits, followed by 1 or more space, followed by 1 or more word characters.
So
abcdefg381 hello --- will match
abcd83138 hello -- will not

Eventually when we have 100% declarative languages we'll be able to just tell the computer the results we want and it'll get them for us.

Think of declarative programming as a man you ask to do a task, he does the task and comes back to you with a solution.
Imperative programming would be an idiot(lol) who doesn't know how to do any tasks, but he knows how to walk, talk, lift, run, jump, sit, so if you give him step by step instructions he can accomplish the same task as the man above.

It's easy if you like doing, like everything else in life