C++ as a first language [closed]

Answer 1

Is C++ a good first language?

It's certainly usable as one, as you've found out. I wouldn't specifically recommend it for an introduction to programming in general (I'd prefer Python or Scheme), but it depends on your goals and learning style. I've taught programming in C successfully, and when approached properly C++ is no more difficult.

If your goal is simply to learn C++ for some particular purpose, I really don't know a better method than going ahead and learning C++.

If you like challenges, you might want to jump into C++. The learning curve is fairly nasty, but once through it you'll know a lot of stuff. (People still do learn how to use the vi editor, after all.)

I would recommend learning the higher-level stuff first. Learn vectors rather than arrays, use smart rather than ordinary pointers, that sort of thing. Partly because you should wind up programming like that (for most purposes), and partly because there's less stuff to remember at first. You will need to learn the lower-level stuff eventually, just like you'll need to learn the bit-twiddling stuff eventually.

Answer 2

For me C++ was my first language too and I guess it was a good choice. You learn all the basic principles of OOP and will understand the logic structure of programming. But of course it depends on what you wanna do with it.

But I'm pretty sure if you switch to rails to do all the fancy web-apps you'll become a much better developper than anyone who started with PHP or - worst case scenario - Rails.

So go for it!

Answer 3

Ignore the haters. C++ can be a first language. My first language was assembler on the TRS-80 Model 1.

Answer 4

C++ as a first language can be OK if you have a good teacher. But it's a pretty high wall to scale for the first time, but once you scale that wall, other similar languages come very easy.

So yes, carry on.

Answer 5

C++ is probably not the best language to start with, and there are much worse choices.

As other have already said, the trick is to learn it correctly, I mean the modern C++ where you'd be able to concentrate (/focus?) on algorithms and the problems to solve, not the C with classes where you'd have to understand memory management while in the early chapters.

AC++ is indeed a very good book to learn modern C++. However without any experience in programming, Francis Glassborrow's You can do it may be a better choice to start with.

Answer 6

If you're four months in and doing fine, stay the course. However, I wouldn't recommend C++ as a first language in general.

In grad school, I was a teaching assistant for a first year computer course that all engineering students had to take. The course used C++ as the teaching language and I think now that this was a very poor choice. About 10-20% of the students 'got it' right away and breezed through the course (as a SO user, you're probably in this catagory), the middle 70-90% worked hard and did OK, and the bottom 10-20% were still having trouble telling the difference between a variable declaration and a function declaration half way through the course.

Too many students were bogged down in the syntax of C++ as opposed to using computers to solve problems, which is what a general first-year computer course should have really been about.