[Tutor] Did you learn to program with Python???

[Arthur]

>Are there any people on this mailing list for whom Python was the first
programming language, or perhaps even better,
>not the first they tried, but the first that worked? :)

Yes..

I had tried Java first. Gave up.  But I did learn some things in that effort
that eventually came into play in learning to program with Python.  And
after getting the concepts of OOP under my belt through Python went back to
Java, which I was then in a position to handle.  And then came back to
Python, because it was simply a lot more fun.

>How did you learn Python?

Time and work.  There were specific reasons I wanted to learn to program (I
am about 45 years old when I get this notion). Most had to do with having
become fascinated with 3d graphics - things like Povray.  I wanted to
understand what made them tick.  But I had a lot else to learn other than
programming - matrice algebra and geometry, for example.  So I just set out
to kill a number of birds with one stone - developed a concept for a program
that would help me learn the geometry, and put to use the algebra and
programming skills I developed, as I was able to develop them.

Lots of experimentation at the command line, before "committing" things to
the program I was trying to write.

And I got hooked, real bad.  Enormous learning experience.

But I think the thing to understand is the fact that it consumed a good deal
of my free time, was hard work and frustrating at times.

I think we can make a mistake by emphasizing how "easy" Python is.  It is a
full-featured, multi-paradigm programming language.  I would call it
"friendly", without hesitation.  But I think folks coming to it with the
idea that it is "easy" will go away frustrated.

>What resource was most helpful?

The command line together with the standard tutorial.

And since my project used Numeric, I relied heavily on the Numeric docs and
tutorial.  A lot of the math was new to me and in some ways harder for me to
absorb than the programming concepts - so a lot of my book budget went to
math and geometry books rather than programming books.

Another thing I found *enormously* helpful - taking advantage of Open Source
resources.  There was a lot of great graphics related Open Source resources
out there - in all kinds of languages - C, C++, Java, etc.  I found it
enormously helpful to simply try to translate code from another language
into Python.  Helped me understand something about programming languages in
general, and limited the problem domain.  Someone else had already done the
hard work of making this particular tick-tock.  My problem was limited to
one of understanding that code well enough to be able to translate it into
Python, and Python well enough to understand how to do that.

>Some person near you?

No. But periodically I have been near desperate to find someone to hold my
hand a bit.  In the end I might well end up paying a Python consultant to
critique my code and steering a course for me as to some of the issues with
which I still need to contend - documentation, cross-platform distribution
issues, a GUI with a more professional look and feel, etc, and etc.  Things
professions have *much* more expereince with than I.

Nonetheless, I am quite proud of how far I have gotten, as a lone hacker.

Art