Can anyone reccomend a coding language to learn?

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mWilton

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Hi,
I want to start learning a form of coding language so that I am able to write applications for a site I'm going to be making in Dreamweaver MX 2004.
I want to it to be able to work well with both mac and pc systems and for me to get a good knowledge of how works as I go.
Deamweaver suggests Coldfusion as a good place to start but I don't know how popular this is as a server application.
Can anyone suggest a good place to start?

Thanks for your time.
 
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PHP ASP or Perl

i know for a fact that PHP is free for personal use and it works on my iBook. i have recently started trying to learn it.
 
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I'd go with PHP... cheaper than ASP and much cheaper than Coldfusion... and more simple than PERL imo.

I use a use PHP/mysql for just about everything web that I do.
 
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Yep PHP and MySQL, my whole business is based around it and it can be run on all platforms. While ASP is limited, Coldfusion is very limited, and all cost quite a bit. Most used language out there right now is PHP :)
 
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Another vote for PHP, pretty easy to learn and works well with MySQL. I like ASP .NET also but finding hosting for it isn't cheap or easy.
 
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K

KuruMonkey

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Go with PHP:

Perl is a dead-end language as far as learning skills that will serve you in the long run, PHP (and many other languages) shares C's base syntax, and that means that the basis of your coding skills will be re-usable. Perl uses its own, backwards IMO, syntax.

Coldfusion is, frankly, pish. Macromedia only recommend it because its theirs; it requires its own special server to run, and they sell that server. Its the equivalent of a car manufacturer telling you only their own branded oil is any good.

ASP is also pish, for the exact same reason as Coldfusion; just replace macromedia with microsoft. The only "advantages" to ASP are the choice of VB syntax, or javascript syntax, neither of which are really advantages.

So; PHP. go to www.php.net - the manual is free online.
 
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Several years ago I choose Perl and recently began using it with MySQL. The reason I choose Perl was because it ran on all systems I was interesting in coding for and there wasn't yet as many free mature choices as their is now. The bonus turned out to be that since it is installed on our Sun boxes at work, I was able to take advantage of my knowledge. But your starting from scratch in 2005!

Today I'd look at PHP, Phython and 'new comer' Ruby. All of them seem to have great support and run on many platforms. Being a programmer I expect I would end up gravitating to one simply based on syntax. You get used to certain things.

If you haven't done any coding, then it will be tough. You need to figure out the basics of your programming needs. For instance, are you going to be accessing a database and a particular vendor one. Then your tool needs that support. Most now have add ons that make that easy, but you need to know that up front. What servers are you expecting to run on, etc.

Also note you may want to learn Javascript, as that would allow you to make your webpages more interactive without to exchange data with the server.

Oh yea. Coldfusion isn't necessary and costs.

Good luck on the journey.
 
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I am thinking about taking up PHP as well... what program would you script in.. just dream weaver... or do you guys recomend something else?
 
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R

ryanyogan

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ASP is dead FYI, its ASP.NET and that allows you to use C#, VB.NET, Javascript, even Java if you want. Don't bother unless you are in for the long run to learn, first you need to learn a language (C# is true OOP much more difficult) then you have to learn the framework (.NET). PHP is great becuase it is free, pretty ****ed quick, and allows for simple lil bits of scripting for simple stuff and has a pretty nice OOP interface too. You can make a pretty nice scalable site using all class's in php now. Not to mention its MySql and MySqlI (php5) support is fantastic. I recomend you head over to www.zend.com and check the absolute beginers section for php5 it seems to have some great tutorials on everything including simple xml and rss!! Good luck and no you can even script php in a simple text edit program if you'd like . I use dreamweaver becuase it has good site organization features, however I have never even tried the "design" mode, your best off learning the languages and never usin drag n drop or your site becomes sloppy!
 
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D

d-funct

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Ruby is most likely to be the 'next big thing' ... also if you install the ruby on rails it makes developing web app a snap ... check it out at www.rubyonrails.com

PHP is the current standard it seems in the web developers world does lots of great stuff, runs on all platforms (unless I'm very much mistaken) and of course is free which always helps

If your looking for database software to go on the backend of it the most well known one is Mysql thought there are other free alternatives out there that offer the same performance price point eg sqlite3 (built in to OSX I think) and there is also postgreSQL (Often recommened when stablitly is an absolute must) each of the DB programs have there quirks when you come to use them.

Personally at this time I would choose to learn Ruby (with ruby on rails) and postgreSQL (simply because its more enterprise level) and of course HTML ;)

Hope this helped
 
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Don't use PHP and DW. DW doesn't code PHP correctly and you will be disapointed. Just learn HTML first, then get the advanced stuff down. But use Cold Fusion DEFINATELY with DW.
 
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ryanyogan

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d-funct said:
Ruby is most likely to be the 'next big thing' ... also if you install the ruby on rails it makes developing web app a snap ... check it out at www.rubyonrails.com

PHP is the current standard it seems in the web developers world does lots of great stuff, runs on all platforms (unless I'm very much mistaken) and of course is free which always helps

If your looking for database software to go on the backend of it the most well known one is Mysql thought there are other free alternatives out there that offer the same performance price point eg sqlite3 (built in to OSX I think) and there is also postgreSQL (Often recommened when stablitly is an absolute must) each of the DB programs have there quirks when you come to use them.

Personally at this time I would choose to learn Ruby (with ruby on rails) and postgreSQL (simply because its more enterprise level) and of course HTML ;)

Hope this helped


Im curious about this ruby rails, why is it you say this is likely to be the next big thing. I have never heard of this before until now, however the site looks interesting. Have you messed around with this yet?
 
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PowerBookG4 said:
I am thinking about taking up PHP as well... what program would you script in.. just dream weaver... or do you guys recomend something else?

i use SubEthaEdit. you can find it on MacUpdate and Version Tracker.
 
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D

d-funct

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I've just heard lots of great stuff about it, I've also heard it meantioned on slashdot quite a few times, and for internal web apps it looks like its going to be hard to beat for simplisity.

I've had a little play around and I got to say it is pretty ****ed easy, I followed the 15 minutes weblog one and also one of the other tutorials and it all just flows, the only problem I had was with mysql not been able to compile but sqlite3 worked just fine as long as you changed the adapter in the config file

Hope this helped
 
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R

ryanyogan

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Well after messing around with the tutorials on Ruby Rails, although I don't have any knowledge on ruby to understand everything, I think we have a real winner here. I am starting to lean towards learning ruby and the rails framework because there is almost no work involved in database tasks. I like this alot, and man I can really see how managable this can be even on huge projects, it also seperates code from content nicely. It seems as if all there developers are huge mac fans, all there screen shots, videos, and even some of the download sites mimick mac os. Looks like php is going to have its first true competitor, both open source, free, and somewhat easy to get out small tasks. My question however is AJAX, does rails impliment some kind of system to automate simple ajax tasks? Or do you still have to be a js guru?
 
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D

d-funct

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I think there is a ajax module you can bolt on ... how ever I've not looked to deep into it .. I think there is a link on the rubyonrails website somewhere
 

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