[BangPypers] how to learn programming

[Sridhar Ratnakumar]

On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 10:37 PM, Venkatraman S <venkat83 at gmail.com> wrote:
> A language is a tool to solve a problem. Each of the problem(s) has its own
> characteristics, which makes us to choose one among the many languages
> around - and hence the choice of the best tool to solve that problem.

I'd add that practically the best tool depends on not just technical
criteria but also the tool familiarity and willingness of the
developers to learn a new tool.

Also, while languages can be /just/ tools to solve problems, the
choice of a programming language during the learning phase greatly
affects your programming skills. For example, programming abstractions
are best studied by using, say, any of the Lisp family of languages
but not C or C++.

"Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally
for machines to execute." - Abelson & Sussman