Start learning at 50
I’ve always wanted to learn programming. I’ve read a blog post saying that at this age it was to late . Then I read a post here in saying the opposite. I’ve found a site that was learn x in y minutes where it has a bunch of languages there. After reading them, the languages that caught my attention were Julia, Clojure and Go. Are any of these good for a beginner or should I start with something else? I know what are variables, can spot an if/else statement but that’s about it. What are some good resources for someone like me who likes to learn by doing things?
People look down on Javascript (and therefore Typescript) but as someone who learned by doing I think its a really good option
Once you get past the hello world phase you can take it any direction you want: websites/apps, command-line stuff, desktop apps you name it. Just avoid the trap of getting sucked into specific frameworks or loads of tooling early on and learn the language
W3schools is a great resource and you can do the examples and exercises right there in your browser
Julia, Clojure and Go
From these 3 I think Go is the most straightforward and similar to most industry standard languages.
Its never too late to start learning something! I am sure you are well aware of your learning rate and how it changes as you get older but that doesn’t mean you cannot learn at all.
As a beginner, often Python is recommended as a simpler language to pick up and start learning.
Do you have a goal in mind with what you want to learn? Learning to write code in general is fine, but if you have an idea in mind that you want to program, different languages maybe a better starting point. For example if you want to build a web app browser based, id suggest learning front end tools like javascript. Whereas if its a desktop app you want to build, python would work well.
Or maybe you want to just learn programming as a concept without any specific goals in mind beyond how stuff works?
Its only too late if its for a career change since you really need to be safe about income and retirement (notto mentions age discrimination). Still could help you in your day job to automate tasks. If you like math puzzles then coding them is a nice hobby too! Learning is always worth it in my opinion.
What are you looking to actually do with your programming skills? That will heavily influence which languages to recommend you learn. Do you want to make websites? build games? do AI stuff? Create enterprise-level software? something else?
This is always the question that trips me up.
I’m 5 years younger than OP. I work in a municipal transportation power system job (we maintain and control the grid for trains, trolleys, etc.). I’m sure I’m wasting all sorts of effort in my professional life. I have time. I got a lot out of learning Power Automate. However, if you ask me to pick one specific project, I get overwhelmed because I don’t know what’s reasonable.
I don’t know enough to know if my ideas are achievable, or if I’d just be bashing my head against the wall. I don’t know if they’re laughably simple tasks, multimillion-dollar propositions, or Goldilocks ideas that would be perfect to learn a coding language.
However, if you ask me to pick one specific project, I get overwhelmed because I don’t know what’s reasonable.
I don’t know enough to know if my ideas are achievable, or if I’d just be bashing my head against the wall. I don’t know if they’re laughably simple tasks, multimillion-dollar propositions, or Goldilocks ideas that would be perfect to learn a coding language.
List out some ideas you’re thinking of. While it may not be obvious to you, someone who is seasoned (me or someone else) might notice at least a general theme or idea to point you in the right direction for where you should go and what you should learn, regardless of if the projects are reasonable.
Note - Most projects take teams to realize, so if your ideas are too large, they might not generally be feasible alone.
Feel free to comment some ideas
I don’t know enough to know if my ideas are achievable, or if I’d just be bashing my head against the wall.
Achievable is subjective, and even if you progress a ways and learn something that makes you realize that that particular project can’t be achieved how you envisioned it, you still have the knowledge to either a) figure out new ways to achieve the same effect, or b) take to a new project.
Knowledge builds on knowledge builds on knowledge. If factor in not starting a project is not knowing enough to know if it’s achievable or not, you’ll never actually get the necessary knowledge to figure that out. You can’t know how to do something until you try to do it…fundamentally.
Julia, Clojure and Go. Are any of these good for a beginner or should I start with something else?
That totally depends on what you want to do.
Go should be easiest since it’s purposefully simplified in order to make learning it easier. There are some more difficult concepts, but the start should be easy enough. I know about go with tests, but it’s not really programming beginner friendly.
I’d avoid clojure as a beginner. It’s more for people who know java, but don’t want to write java. Common lisp and schemes are good for learning programming, but they’re not a popular group of languages and that can be a problem.
I’m a big proponent of life-long learning. Never let anyone tell you that you shouldn’t learn something. Do you know what types of things you would want to write a program to do? It’s easier if you have a goal in mind as it will provide a motivation as well as specific things to learn since “programming” is a rather large topic.
Clojure, Julia and go are very different languages. Of the three “go” is probably the most popular and would likely have a lot of resources available for learning. Python is also a very popular and “beginner friendly” language since it’s interpreted and you can run scripts without the need for compiling them. But they’re all fine languages so if you’re drawn to one go for it. There are many concepts that are simply “language agnostic” so if you learn one language it will be easier to switch to another language later. You’re not going to be locked in. That said Clojure will be the most different from the others you’ve listed. It’s a so-called “functional language” which has a different approach from non-functional languages. This is not a criticism, just an FYI. Though functional languages do tend to be “less popular” generally but with a core of people who simply love them. Your mileage may vary.
And there is an important point to make here - programming is about more than learning languages. There are many concepts that you’ll want to learn as well that are used when programming. “Object Oriented” programming, the aforementioned “functional programming”, various data structures (lists, maps, arrays, etc.). many algorithms for things like sorting, searching, etc. The list goes on. To start with you’ll want to learn simple data types (numbers, strings, probably dates) and data structures (lists, maps, arrays). Then move to more complex data structures (“structs”, classes, queues, etc.).
Once you’ve selected a language you’ll want to consider a development environment. What will you write code with, how will you run it, etc. Often some sort of IDE (Integrated Development Environment) is useful as it will provide many tools that assist in running your code. There are sometimes different IDEs for different languages, and some that support many languages. VSCode is a flexible option that is free, IntelliJ is another good option but is commercial (though with a “community edition” that is free). You can always ask here about tooling.
These days I would start out with an AI helping you. AI’s get a lot of crap for “sometimes generating bad or non-working code” but they can be extremely helpful as a learning aide and for explaining concepts, code, etc. They’re infinitely patient and provide near-instant response. I’ve been coding for, well, we’ll just say “some time” but even I’ve found AIs very helpful when learning a new language. You can directly ask it “what’s that ‘?:’ thing on line 4?” and get a good quick response vs. trying to google “?:” without knowing it’s called “the elvis operator”. Some AIs are better at coding than others and they’re getting better almost daily. If you’ve sat for an hour trying to figure out why something isn’t working chances an AI can often provide some guidance and keep you from getting too frustrated.
Edit: One thing I should add is that you will find many people with very strong opinions in the programming community. These opinions can be about which languages are good, what editors you should use, etc. Take any guidance that “X sucks” or “avoid Y” with a grain of salt. Best to ignore them completely and look for people who have more reasoned responses.
It’s always worthwhile to learn new things!
And programming is a tool, so it’s typically made to be clear how to use it, although of course people will differ on what needs to be clarified the most.
My experience is that there’s way too much discussion in what tool to pick, it doesn’t matter that much and almost all of the common languages will allow you to do all the things. And even though some will be better adapted for certain applications, it’s easy to pick up the new tool when relevant, and you’ll be that much ahead by being well versed in one.
As for how to learn, I find that you kind of need to figure out the basic syntax in each language (loops, conditionals, output, memory management, typology, lists, function calling, maybe classes/libraries if you’re fancy), and then start doing projects.
A nice intro for C# is the C# Player’s Guide by R B Whitaker, using some gamification and storytelling to get you through the basics, and even leave you prepared to tackle your first projects (by practicing design philosophy, how to break down projects, etc).
Otherwise, Python is a lot of fun, it’s made to be very easy to jump into, and then it’s fully featured to do anything you’d like it to. Unfortunately all my resources for it are in my local language, but it has many many users so I’m sure there’s great resources to be found in your own language.
Find a computer problem that you want to solve and focus on technologies that will help you solve it. Traditionally python is considered an excellent learning language due to the wide library support and adherence to most common programming styles - is there any romanticized pet project you’ve got on your brain?
I’m 48. Last year, during a period of unemployment, I decided that to kill time I wanted to create a 3D aircraft model for my flight simulator (X-Plane). I had dabbled in Blender in the past, but nothing too in depth. So I sat down and just did it.
Some of the features I wanted to implement required plugins that had to made with Lua (a programming language) so again…I just did it.
Age and learning have nothing to do with each other. Regardless of the topic. I feel like maybe the only valid reason that such ideas took hold is because the older we get, the less time we have to focus on learning new things, and so it can seem as though we can’t learn, when in reality we just don’t have the time to. That’s certainly what I found to be the case personally. It wasn’t until I had literally nothing else to do that I could focus on really learning 3D Modelling and basic programming.
The solution to that, that I found, was to be project based. I wouldn’t have made as much progress if I didn’t specifically have some thing I wanted to make, whether that’s an app, a 3D model, or whatever.
This is what I’ve found too. Tutorials help to learn tools and some basic techniques, but actual learning requires doing. That’s easy if you have something you want to do, but incredibly difficult if you don’t.
It is never too late to learn something like this. Especially now when there are so many resources that can help you to learn it. It is another story if you want to find a job as a programmer, because I think the majority of companies prefer to hire younger talents.
Python is an excellent choice for a beginner.
Good luck and keep going!
Python is suitable for beginner and is also easy to write code in different fields. I’m a developer, half of my time is writing code to get things done, and the other half is learning more development techniques, which I’ve been learning for over twenty years.
ChatGPT is great at tutoring python. Go as well. Not sure on the others.
I’m around the same age as you, and I taught myself front end development. Don’t let anyone say you can’t learn. If you want to make websites, I suggest HTML => CSS => JavaScript => React.js. I recommend learning on Scrinba.com. They have a screen cast system where an actual instructor tells you what to do in plain English with the corresponding code on screen. If you want to see how a change would affect the code, you can pause the cast and run the code yourself.
And if you want to learn back end, a back end programmer suggested learning PHP. Still in high demand in the job market.
Should be Scrimba.com
Changed it. Thanks.
I’d actually recommend to start with C#, it’s the perfect balance from complexity and simplicity, so you don’t miss out on certain learning curves.
