Vague question, but wondering... my brother learned javascript a few years ago and got real good at it. Then, it seems javascript has fallen out of some favor. 13% of the people don't have it turned on. That's a lot.
I note over the past few years, there was Perl. Then it seems PHP became the hottie. Now, my brother is hyped up about Python.
Question is, I guess, is... is this just the way it is? You learn a language and get good at it and then somebody dreams up a better one and you have to learn that one. Or will Perl be just perfectly fine from now on. Or are there better languages that beat Perl and you are best advised to go ahead and jump on the best one. Confusing.
How does this happen? Is this usually attributed to one person? Some whiz dreams up a better language?
is this just the way it is? You learn a language and get good at it and then somebody dreams up a better one and you have to learn that one.
Yep..that is pretty much the way it seems to work nowdays.
I even find that the HTML code my programs use are already out of date...that bites! But it also seems that a language has to be chosen based on what the majority of browsers and servers will accept.
I once looked at a hosting place where even JavaScript was disallowed...but that is a bit of digression...but the world of computer language is always changing...too fast for my taste!
Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return.
To obtain, something of equal value must be lost.
That is Alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange.
In those days we really believed that to be the worlds one, and only truth. - FullMetal Alchemist
Major languages change but not much, they may come out with new versions but the syntax will most likely remain the same. I mean If you know c++ that is going to be useful to you forever even if some new form of c++ comes out the syntax is not going to be too different. Now technolgies that are not actual languages change very often, ASP came out a few years ago then beginning of last year ASP.NET came out. ASP.NET acts a lot like ASP but its a new technolgy and it uses vb instead of vbsecript. But knowing ASP cant hurt.
One thing to point out on this topic... Once you've learned a programming language, it is much easier to learn another one, since you have the main idea behind programming. Example: I learned C first. When I went to learn JS, I basically just picked it up and used it. The same thing when I decided to learn PHP. You only have to learn what the new commands are, not learn the whole thing again. I don't know if that makes any sense, but...
Another thing I want to point out is that there are basically just two different programming types. Almost all languages are built off of either C or Basic. C, PHP, JavaScript, Java, ect. are in one group while Visual Basic, ASP, VBScript, etc. are in the other group. Once you know one in the group it is expecially easy to go to another language in that group. At least that is what I've found...
If you are extremenly good at JavaScript, it will help you comprehend Java programming a great deal,since JavaScript uses almost the same syntax and and object reference style.
such as if you know how to create a date object in JavaScript its identical in the Java the only different in JavaScript is that you do not need to decalre the type of the object such as
Date date = new Date(); this is Java
var date = new Date();// JavaScript..
I am sure you get the point.
Thre are talks that in near future,newer versions of JavaScript (2.0 may be???) you will be able to assign data types for variables as well..we'll see
I just want to add that some of the languages you mentioned aren't going anywhere. Pearl is alive and kicking and should not be pushed aside. PHP being matched up with MySQL so well means it's sticking around for a long time. Yes, the net is a new technology and there's going to be a lot of things happeneing before it settles down, but I would try to go around jumping on the latest trend when there's plently to learn about the stuff that's already out there.
My bro is the techie guy, I am the marketing guy. I know enough coding to be dangerous. I somehow get my pages to work. Anyway, we are seeking a content management solution for getting new clients. He is all hopped up on Plone, which has a content management interface, based on Zope, which is based on Python. Maybe I said all of that right.
The deal is... if Plone allows me to use Perl, PHP, etc., fine. If not, if everytime I want to do something, he has to write a python code for it, that could take forever. Whereas, now, there are THOUSANDS of scripts, heck, thousands of programmers writing PERL or PHP scripts to do this and that. Already, scores of useful things out there. Whereas, scripts in Python, there aren't that many.
He wants to keep it 'clean' and stick with Python stuff. And the stuff that the Plone (open source) community comes up with. To me, that just drastcially cramps my style. It's limiting.
So, if anyone has any thoughts about Python or anything i said, please do.
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