Looking for a compiled programming language

Most of the languages I know are scripting languages, such as Perl and PHP, but I don't have a lot of knowledge of compiled languages, such as C or C++. I am looking to find out which language I should start learning. Ease of use and availability of help are my primary concerns.

So... what you're actually gonna program doesn't matter?

if you want to code on a win**** platform, get delphi. for personal use you can even download it for free

it´s the greatest tool for this purpose i ever met (and i have xp in about 10-15 different languages)

I found java pretty easy to learn. Easier than C++ anyway...

I would recommend you learn psuedo(sp?) code because the best thing to do is to learn how to program. If you know how to program then you simply need to learn the syntax of a language.

If you want to just 'cut your teeth', then I would recommend something like Pascal to learn programming. If you want to more powerful stuff then go for C, C++, or Java.

Compiled languages are not necessarily extremely different from interpreted languages. If you have some experience in programming (regardless of the language), check out C - get a good book (not about MFC programming) and if you don't have a compiler yet, download a copy of gcc for your platform. The language is brutal but does not lack a certain beauty:

I'd say C is very easy to learn, it's very small and many other languages are derived from C, so you'll probably recognize many elements. The thing about C is that you need to be fairly familiar with the hardware level, and you have access to very low-level things.

And of course, getting yourself acquainted with all the available libraries might be a bit of a job...

Hey, nowhereman, he wants some advice for getting into programming, not to scare him like hell. this is really hard bread. it took me quite some time despite >10yrs of programming exp. to figure out what these lines do!!!


andnaess, yes, this is exactly why nowhereman´s lines are so hard to understand. it´s the low-level thing.
doing bitshifting nibble-wise, And´ing and modulo to find out how many 1´s in a number there are... this looks like some 2nd year university level stuff! i have no idea how this can work

to gamblor:
easier (but probably slower) solution:

int onebits=0;
for (i=0;i<32;i++) if (x & power(2,i)) onebits++;

(is there a power function in ansi c? if not, i remember it being something like i*exp(ln(2)) or similar... which i can´t explain either - i hate mathematics)

gratulation to andnaess for his 1500th post

Gamblor said:

So, "most of the languages" and "such as". That makes at least three, of which one is unknown (and compiled) and the two others are definitely quite tough. Gamblor has definitely got into programming already.

Java is a pretty good language to learn, since it teachers Object Orienated stuff, and you spend more time learning how to program, instead of worrying about memory allocation and doing things in destructors, etc.

C/C++ generally gets better impressions for making real programs, but I recommand Java for learning. It doesn't take much to learn another language if you know how to program anyway.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but you already know two compilable languages: Perl and PHP. Perl is compiled the first time it is run, and the compiled version stays in memory for the next execution. PHP can be compiled using the Zend tools, although you have to buy them.

As to what language(s) you should learn, it all depends on what you want to do.

Why the idea that you must learn a "compiled" language?? Is it "just because" or do you have a particular project in mind?? Is this to bolster your resume, for work?? Why??

You have to answer those, and questions like them, beforehand.