Programming

Learing the bases of programming is language agnostic really. You can start even with pseudo code, then learn the language you will like to work with. Just choose any language that seems fun and enjoy the process.

Good luck!

I question the suggestion that Zig and Go are not "serious" programming languages. They certainly weren't designed to be "easy" beginner languages.

I don't think it matters a whole lot which language you start with. Learning to program is largely separate from learning a particular language, and if you do programming for a while, you'll probably learn several. I do think someone who wants to understand programming deeply should learn each of:

• A lisp, probably Racket, but others will do. This teaches a lot about how computation works, and is at least a local maximum for abstractive power.
• C, an assembly language, or something similar where the developer must manage memory manually and has the ability to mismanage it. This teaches how computers work.
• A statically typed functional language, probably Haskell. This makes programming more math-like and probably represents a local maximum for what can be proven about a program's behavior without solving the halting problem.
• SQL. I wish there was something prettier with a modicum of popularity that does what it does (PRQL is my favorite recent attempt), but there isn't. This teaches thinking about data in sets and relations, and you will almost certainly use it in practice.

Go is not serious? TIL.

There is benefit in learning any language.

Python is one of the most-widely used languages in the world.

The trouble with “easy” languages is that they allow you to write incorrect code without much pushback.

The trouble with “serious” languages is that they push back even when you’re writing correct code.

There’s plenty to learn from either route. Just pick something that piques your interest and dive in.

Anything is better than nothing.

Go and Zig are serious languages. Go is especially established and has a big ecosystem and capabilities. You could stick with Go forever if you don't want to expand afterwards.

Starting 'simpler' is better because it gives you successes. It keeps you going.

no. You must start with malboge

Zig or go are not that unserious of languages. Zig is arguably quite hard due to being pretty low-level. Maybe think about what domain you want to do programming in.. Python might be a decent starting point tho (easy language, no memory management)

crazy to call zig, a low level systems language, an "easy" language

Is this bait? Zig and Go are very much serious, especially Zig.

Generally python/Javascript is good for learning the basics. To know how types work learn c#/java/go. To learn how the memory works Zig/C are good. To learn about what a fully defined behavior means in a program you learn Rust. To learn what actually happens on the processor you learn assembly.

Honestly, if you're hyped about Zig go for it, although I'd suggest "warming up" by doing a tic tac toe in python.

It's not so much easy-difficult, it's high-level-low-level. Low-level languages can be easy in the sense that you don't have many entities to juggle (stacks, registers, etc.) and high-level languages can be miserable, like C++.
Of you're interested in starting with the fundamentals, go with C. If you just want to get something made, go with ~~Claude~~ Python.

Zig and Go are serious. I think Python would be a language that isn't serious (despite it's widespread use in serious applications) but has a reputation for being easy. I don't know if that reputation is really deserved.

Anyway I would start with one of Python, Go or Typescript (via Deno). I would avoid Rust, Haskell, OCaml, C++ as your very first language, but they could be your second.

Whatever you do don't learn Python and stop there. That's the way to be a crap programmer. And if you do use Python learn to use type hints early on.

It us totally OK to start easy.

Scheme (for example Guile) or Racket are great beginner languages, because they have a very minimal core, and at the same time a lot of power. Created by teachers, they also have great guides.

Clojure is also a fantastic Lisp language, extremely elegant and very powerful. Its user community has many experienced programmers, and it is very friendly.

Python is probably the most popular choice for beginners. It has a nice tutorial and countless libraries, which allows to put programs together from components. But its build and packaging system is notoriously messy (though it seems improving) and can get in the way when doing more complex stuff later. Its user forums also suffer currently most from AI slop.

I wouldn't recommend Go language for beginners. It is relatively simple, true, but although it is well-geared to its main target - web applications - it has serious pitfalls with concurrency, which can lead to arcane bugs and a lot of hair-pulling.

You could also start with Rust. The language is larger than others, that's true. But you do not need to learn it all at once. Also, it has best-in-class online tutorials, books and documentation. Its compiler error messages are extremely helpful. And its build and packaging system are so much easier to use than almost anything else. This matters for beginners, too, since this allows you to put together interesting programs quickly.

I found it easier to start with something considered medium difficulty, because "easy" languages abstract away a lot of problems of programming. So when certain problems arise, its hard to understand what is happening behind the scenes.

If you want to build something, python is great. If you wanna learn programming, it might be confusing.

Yes 99% of programming is the higher level thought process behind making a program, and that skill transfers between programming languages. The specific syntax doesn’t matter that much.

Firstly, Zig and Go are serious. Anybody who told you different isn't a good person to learn from.

My journey was:

• Basic (various dialects)
• 6502 assembly
• Forth
• 68000 assembly
• Pascal
• C
• Perl
• C++
• Python
• x86 assembly
• Java
• Haskell
• RISC-V assembly
• Zig

With some others thrown in I'm sure and some hardware description languages. The stuff I learnt in Basic 45 years ago is still relevant today. I learnt something from all of them. It doesn't really matter where you start, but you have to take a first step and you need to write code to learn, even if it's just copying it. It has to go through your fingers.

Logic is common to all programming languages. Everything else is syntax and knowing what functions or utilities you can capitalize on. No matter how complex things seem under the hood it's only one instruction at a time that is being processed. Speed and memory make it seem like multitasking. It's as simple as "If this, then that". Once you get the foundations of logic down, you're good to go. Everything else is experience and time takes care of that. Good luck and have fun. As far as confidence goes my mantra throughout life, especially when faced with complex situations is a derisive "How hard can this be?", while plodding forward.

so one thing about programming languages is at the end of the day, they can all generally accomplish the same things. they are all turing complete and generally capable of expressing programs that any of the others can.

as others in this thread have said, many patterns you learn within one programming language will transfer to others. some personal context, i attended and then taught at a coding bootcamp for a year about a decade ago, saw over 300 students and have been doing software engineering since. it was full time and the students would learn ruby basics over 4 weeks and then would be able to do the same things in javascript in a few days. that said, those languages are pretty similar but i hope it makes the point.

so my main suggestion is to start with a general purpose, syntactically simple language. the less syntax and overhead in the language, the more you will be able to focus on the fundamentals of programming and less on jumping through the hoops of the language you're working with. stay away from typed languages for at least the first few months unless you really really only want to do low level stuff.

some languages i think you should consider: ruby, python, javascript. they are relatively similar for a beginner. python has more usage in data heavy scenarios due to it's extensive data libraries. ruby's whole mantra is being a joy to write. javascript is simple but that also means you don't get much help from it out of the box. consider it as a first/second language mainly if you are interested in websites.

Any language is good to start with. When you learn a language pick one that makes sense to you. The main thing you are learning is not the language it's how to change how you think about problems. From there the differences between languages are technical and any language can be conquered in time except JavaScript because fuck JavaScript.

Go is great to learn on. Go for it. And it's super useful for web dev.

Where did you get the idea that Zig is an "easy" language?

Any use? Always! Exercising your brain will never be a bad investment!

But which language really depends on why you want to learn and what you want to do with it, though! Coming at it from a 'languages with an abundance of learning resources' perspective (sorry not exhaustive):

• You want to program devices; LEDs, microcontrollers, sensors, etc? Python!

• You want to make a pretty website? JavaScript with the React framework!

• You want to prototype out a monolithicly big web app quickly? Ruby on Rails!

• You want to make infographics? R!

• You want to start a career in Software Engineering? JavaScript with Node, Go, Rust, or C# with dot-net framework, and many more*. Also, abort, don't do this, AI is decimating the job seeking field right now.

So, it really depends on what YOU want to do with it. As others have hinted, a programming language is often just 'syntactic sugar' to accomplish the same programming concepts. Most all the modern languages can do the same things, just using different function-names/words/syntax. So as a learner, just frankly ignore all the "{X} is best at {Y}" arguments, including those above, and instead: concentrate on the concepts (like loops, recursion, associations, type control, etc, etc, etc.) over the specific language, first. Good luck OP!

I don't think most languages you'll encounter in the wild are too "easy".

Universities here start you off with Python in the first semester because it's easy for beginners to grasp. That doesn't mean it's not "serious" though, the whole AI/ML/Big Data ecosystem is ALL Python, largely because there are excellent data processing libraries for Python and stuff like PyTorch for offloading work to the GPU.

Just don't try to use Powerpoint for programming, it's possible but you'll go mad.

Leant how to solve problems with if, else if, else and for and while, and you can do a ton of stuff. Learn how to work with objects and APIs and you’ve got the basics for any language. You will always need to learn syntax, convention, and secure practices, but the fundamentals don’t change.

Go is easy??

Zig or Go are serious programming languages. Zig is actually the language I would least recommend for complete beginners because in my opinion it is one the most serious languages currently. What lead you to your examples Zig and Go and how do you determine what a 'serious' programming language is?

C

My personal 2 bits: start with JavaScript.

You can run it in your browser console and get at least a little but of benefit from it no matter how far you go, scripting on web pages you use regularly.

Thanks to Node, you can reasonably build full stack systems with it. Fair warning, it's really best for I/O, so it's not really ideal for genuinely logically complex stuff.

You'll more quickly get to bigger tangible benefits connecting things that have already been built anyway.

Python as a starter otherwise, which is suitable for that genuinely logically complex stuff.

If Zig is easy than that means C is easy (as Zig is pretty much nicer written C) and if C is easy than, oh wait everything is written in C. I guess the only thing left to do is learn an unnecessary overcomplicated abstraction of C like java or C++.

As for the question, pick a task than pick a language, servers? Go seems to be replacing Java for the next generation, Games? Zig C# Odin C C++ Lua, Rewrites? Rust. Random small scripts? Python. Bare metal? C C++ Zig.

Also Zig Odin and Go are all C like languages if you learn one you learn about them all (with the exception of manual memory management for Go). My biased self recommend Zig as I think its the nicest, you almost certainly won't get a job in it but the skills will transfer directly to C or Go where you can get jobs.

It's...sort of not a question of easy vs hard. Why would anyone make a hard programming language?

It's more about picking a language that is suitable for what you want to do with it.

Doing anything with your brain will always increase it's aptitude in that "topic".

People that learn lots of human languages become better and better at learnig further human languages.

People that do one type of math get better at learning other types of math.

People that do something with their body coordination (athletes) can pick up other types of body coordination (other sports or dance for example.) faster compared to couch potatoes.

etc.

So doing anything with your brain is already useful, even as just a "workout".

Nothing is easy when learning programming from scratch and by yourself ; just choose whatever you feel is cool (at beginner level, it does not make a big difference).

Avoid the compilation process by using interpreted language

Go seems like a good option to begin with; you can do a lot with it, and it's not that complicated but does expose you to concepts like pointers.

There are plenty of very "serious" systems written in Go (e.g. Kubernetes), it's not a toy language.

I don’t know about zig, but go is absolutely serious.

I try to only write in easy language if I can. My favorite one is Lean4.

There's lots of this vs that discussion in this thread. IMO the most useful such distinction I've encountered is languages that encourage you to think about data vs languages that encourage you to think about transformations (of data). Excel and modern OOP are the former while haskell and digital signal processing are the latter.

Go is as serious as it gets. Go is also pretty simple and gives you great foundation and understanding.

Either go with Go (!) or with a lisp like racket, following the book https://htdp.org/ These are different approaches but will give you a huge headstart and better understanding of how to actually design a system instead of getting lost in code. I personally recommend the second approach to people who ask me.

Exactly don't start with easy languages you should start with the best programming language HolyC, the divine language.

Lmao. First, everyone is right. Go is serious. An Zig as well. And a bit niche.

Furthermore: Yes. Unless you like learning curves as steep as a brick wall... You should probably start with something beginner friendly.

And you should get some kind of book to learn it. That's easier and faster than poking around and learning things in random order.

As an adult, just skip the programming languages made for children. And skip the crazy ones like PHP. Go for something that is both useful and doesn't come with 5 bazillion things to learn at once, and as many exceptions to those rules.

I learned with python and switched to rust when that started to piss me off. It'll be awhile until you know enough about why you want a different language for a task. Until then, python and JavaScript are totally fine; you may never even need to leave those ecosystems depending on what you want to do.

When I first started programming I was constantly thinking the same thing: should I learn this or that language? Will it be useful or a waste of time?, etc but it really doesn't matter. Nearly every modern language has the same core principles of variables, constants, functions and data structures. Once you've gotten the hang of those ideas then switching languages is just a matter of learning the new syntax which isn't hard when you already know how it's going to work