Any programmers in the house ?
4 years ago
Northamptonshire, England

New here, but just thought I'd ask, any programmers here? I'm a novice don't really know any languages properly, just mess about from time to time, currently starting to learn basic on the C64

RetroPacman likes this
Ireland

Try Javascript/HTML/CSS easy to make some basic games and much less tedious to debug than line code. BASIC was fun but there's much more fun to be had with just javascipt.

After that you can move on to more advanced stuff. There are loads and loads of tutorials out there.

RetroPacman and NEStalgia like this
Northamptonshire, England

Thanks, but BASIC has always been my goal, I know a little bit of Python though, I'm more into the retro languages like BASIC and Assembler

Antarctica

I’d recommend learning the instruction set for MIPS if you want to learn assembler. It was common in game development for many years (I believe up to the PS2) so if you’re interested in disassembling games that might be up your alley.

Edited by the author 4 years ago
NEStalgia likes this
Ireland

Its probably out of print but if you can find it The A-Z of Computer Games by Thomas C McIntire is a great book for learning basic. It has 26 BASIC games, in depth analysis of everything that is happening in the programs and really fun to play about with. (I even used this to make me own javascript blackjack program as the logic is fine)

The Amstrad CPC464 manual had a load of learning materials also theres bound to be a digital version online nowadays, a bit of tweaking and they should work fine on C64 or speccy also. Good luck

NEStalgia likes this
Northamptonshire, England

Thanks guys, been looking for some books for ages, found quite a few but nothing incredibly useful

Ireland

Came across this on the youtubes you might like, its an old programming video:

Northamptonshire, England

Thanks man, I've actually picked up PICO-8, feel quite comfortable with it, quite a good fantasy console

Washington, D.C., USA

Python/Django here :-)

RetroPacman likes this
Texas, USA

I developed an rpg by myself for 6 ish years, I love art and coding. My codebase is currently 57,868 lines total, I revise it often to keep it manageable, readable, and efficient, with descriptive yet concise comments and well encapsulated object oriented code. I aim to keep the linecount reasonably low, and enjoy trying to find smart solutions to problems. I made a lot of mistakes the first several years, so all of my code hsa been rewritten from scratch at least once, totaling over 120k lines through the lifespan of my work on this one project.

The computer scientists and mathematicians that I look up to the most are Don Knuth, Grace Hopper, Erik Demaine, Alan Turing, Paul Erdos, Jonathan Shewchuk, Alex Aiken, and Tom Apostol. Many of which either have really great online lecture series, documentaries, or incredibly well written books. I'm pretty dumb, and I'm a bit handicapped by chronic pain, but sometimes I manage to look smart by standing on the shoulders of these giants. I highly recommend any of their work you might find.

(Sorry for bumping an somewhat old thread)

Phoenix, AZ, USA

Started with Java back in 1999. My advise if you really want to understand computer programming is to fully learn multiple languages. Most high level languages work the same with different syntax.

Languages that I learned over the years that may help you are, Java C# which is Microsoft and simular to Java but if you are coding in Windows is native which allows code to run faster. Python C++

If you want better understanding of hardware and GPU programming Assembly is the best place to start.

Edited by the author 4 years ago
Glamorganshire, Wales

Computer Science student here, learning some pretty advanced stuff by now but I wish I was better Messing around can be great fun btw for just anything, I try to use programs to work out questions (like the longest word with particular letters) because it's easy and fun and only requires python.

SoloLearn is actually not a bad place to learn some great programming skills, it's genuinely free and I'm not really advertising them, but a good place to start!

RetroPacman likes this