Programming

So, I'm actually new to programming, and thought some basics would be really benefiting to me, I'm not really asking to be spoon-fed with everything you know, I just need some info to show where should i start, I can figure the rest by myself, but really am in doubt about which programming language i should use as a first one, I've been thinking about using python, since a friend recommended it, but some people also recommended me Java, and, since my roommate broke his computer i've been asked, more like forced really to install windows, so there's my second question, is there any difference if i run Ubuntu on a virtual machine? also, is any Linux distribution better or worse for this task? thank you in advance, and sorry if this thread isn't in the right place :D

Few programmers really restrict themselves to one language, since they all have their strengths and weaknesses.

Java is useful, but also fairly strict and rigid; you get less choices about the way you write your programs. You're forced to use OOP and nothing but OOP since literally everything is an object. You're forced to use try/catch since so most things don't bother returning errors any other way. And so-on. It's a whole lot to learn at once just to make the simplest possible program.

I haven't managed to come to grips with Python myself. The way whitespace is actually important in Python code is pretty unusual in a programming language.

Perl is pretty popular and powerful and has lots of modules available. It's also kind of eccentric, being a weakly-typed language with complex data structures and OO.

I'd actually suggest shell scripting, with a modern shell like BASH, so you can get yourself acquainted with variables, arrays, loop structures, functions, and I/O without having someone's pet programming methodology crammed down your throat.

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Shell scripting doesn't have data structures though, unfortunately, and can't do a lot of things directly. So once you've learned the basics you could try a more flexible language like C. Properly-written C code can work on lots of different systems.

This is the book I remember most from my college days. I kind of regret giving it away now.

---------- Post updated at 04:49 PM ---------- Previous update was at 04:47 PM ----------

If Ubuntu will work on a virtual machine for you, that'll be good enough for teaching purposes, and better than things like Cygwin which still technically run inside Windows. Might not be the best for teaching though, it's autoconfiguration is a bit overzealous. Perhaps Fedora or SuSe?

you helped me a lot, i should be able to figure out what to do now, just gotta keep trying :D

I forgot to link the advanced bash scripting guide. I still use it all the time, particularly the 'list of tables' section