C#

[taco24501]

Who thinks a C# is a good place to start for a programming language for non collage age person?

 

[PTNL]

Who thinks C# for IT Admin to learn

You'll first need to improve the grammar and phrase it as a question.

Once that's done, elaborate on what an "IT Admin" means to you. Are you referring to yourself? Are you (or the person you are referring to) currently a student or in the IT workforce? What made you want to make this post?

 

[calebb]

Who thinks C# for IT Admin to learn

I do.

 

[Whatsisname]

the what now?

 

[Volume]

The whole thing?

 

[taco24501]

Ok what im trying to say is as a IT admin dealing with the day to day of a mid size law firm should I take the time to learn a programming language.

 

[PTNL]

Ok what im trying to say is as a IT admin dealing with the day to day of a mid size law firm should I take the time to learn a programming language.

To which my question is back to you: Is development something that you want to get into?

If there's a particular C# project you're considering tackling, then pass along those details and any expected timeframes (either stated or implied) from the law firm.


Edit: As a general rule, please don't go back and completely rewrite previous posts (e.g. your first post). It really muddles the thread progression and makes things confusing.

 

[Lunknumb]

A programming language, definitely. But probably not C# if your aim is something that'll help you day to day. It's aimed at software development, and not administration tasks.

If you want to make software for others: Learn C# or Java.

If you want to automate admin tasks on the spot: Learn the shell scripting language of you platforms flavor + Python for the heavy lifting.

 

[calebb]

A programming language, definitely. But probably not C# if your aim is something that'll help you day to day. It's aimed at software development, and not administration tasks.

If you want to make software for others: Learn C# or Java.

If you want to automate admin tasks on the spot: Learn the shell scripting language of you platforms flavor + Python for the heavy lifting.

It depends on what kind of tasks -

C# is great for writing many system admin tasks related to Microsoft products - i.e., SQL Server, AD management, file management, etc.

PowerShell might be an even better choice - and easier to learn since you can just type "powershell" from a run prompt and start testing commands in real-time.

 

[taco24501]

ok thanks guys

 

[Red Squirrel]

Personally I think C/C++ is a great way to start. Once you know the concept behind programming, then dive into OOP in C++. Once you are familiar with OOP then you can always look at other languages.

I like to think of C++ as a "base" language. You do not need anything special such as a specific OS or specific set of libraries for it to work. It's not owned or controlled by any company and is fairly standard.

C# and .NET in general seems to be the in thing lately as far as corporate stuff goes, so it's not a bad thing to learn either. It would just be too bad for someone to learn that stuff without really seeing the big picture. .NET does a lot of stuff for you that you won't even know about if you don't touch a language like C++.

 

[calebb]

.NET does a lot of stuff for you that you won't even know about if you don't touch a language like C++.

.NET is a framework, not a language. In fact, many .NET developers write C++ ...

"C++: The Most Powerful Language for .NET Framework Programming" (MSDN)

C# and .NET in general seems to be the in thing lately as far as corporate stuff goes, so it's not a bad thing to learn either.

Do you believe that C# and/or .NET are a fad? How many more years would you estimate that they will be the "in thing"?

 

[eon]

for Windows administration it could be useful but I wouldnt think its that necessary
the Windows admins at this place dont program at all
if its a unix admin then knowing some scripting is pretty much a must

 

[Red Squirrel]

.NET is a framework, not a language. In fact, many .NET developers write C++ ...

"C++: The Most Powerful Language for .NET Framework Programming" (MSDN)

Maybe I was not that clear. But no .NET is not a language, but it's basically a set of Microsoft made/modified languages. Their version of C++ is very different then standard C++.

For example, something like this will compile in VC++:

for(int i=0;i<5;i++)
{
//stuff
}

int a=i;  (i will still be in scope)

In real C++ this is invalid because i loses it's scope after the for loop. There's other stuff like this, but this is one of the most whacked ones I've found. Used to piss me off in college when we had to use VC++.

Not saying .NET is bad, it's just, a new programmer should be open and realize there's more to programming then just the microsoft platform and company controlled languages. Also jumping straigth to OOP may be too much. C/C++ gives you the flexibility of starting off with no OOP then adding some in. I think it's important to learn and understand basic instructional coding before getting into the more advanced stuff.

Sure you can run .NET on Linux but it's not really native and requires 3rd party emulation tools (mono).

 

[taco24501]

it mainly just for me. but i can see the need for it in the firm. C# from my stand point is a "C like" but with out the need to go down to the belly of the beast

 

[socK]

Maybe I was not that clear. But no .NET is not a language, but it's basically a set of Microsoft made/modified languages. Their version of C++ is very different then standard C++.

For example, something like this will compile in VC++:

for(int i=0;i<5;i++)
{
//stuff
}

int a=i;  (i will still be in scope)

In real C++ this is invalid because i loses it's scope after the for loop. There's other stuff like this, but this is one of the most whacked ones I've found. Used to piss me off in college when we had to use VC++.

Not saying .NET is bad, it's just, a new programmer should be open and realize there's more to programming then just the microsoft platform and company controlled languages. Also jumping straigth to OOP may be too much. C/C++ gives you the flexibility of starting off with no OOP then adding some in. I think it's important to learn and understand basic instructional coding before getting into the more advanced stuff.

Sure you can run .NET on Linux but it's not really native and requires 3rd party emulation tools (mono).

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/84wcsx8x(VS.80).aspx

and mono is not an emulator

 

[Red Squirrel]

Well mono emulates .net code in non windows environment, so what is it then? It's certainly not running natively, and there is a lot of overhead, not to mention not everything is guaranteed to work, as they basically had to recode .net and try to be as close as possible to MS.

 

[Lunknumb]

It's certainly not running natively

It cetrainly is. It's still native code implementing the same API, and MONO's JIT compiler does the same thing the CLR does, compiles the IL into native machine code on the platform it's running on.

It's a different implementation of .NET, but it's just as "real" in terms of how it works, it doesn't emulate any hardware. It doesn't need to, everything in the CLR spec is CPU agnostic and the APIs are just software anyway. The official implementation just happens to be Wintel.

With MONO Touch they even take it one step further than Microsoft does and provide static compiled native binaries for iOS that'll run on iPhone/iPad, from .Net based IL.

You probably use STL with C++. If you use STL on windows, does that mean that an STL implementation for Linux is an emulation?

 

[dirtrider]

Used to be I'd recommend starting vb but c# really is easy these days at least as far as getting started is concerned. Much more use and examples of it too.

Also, you'll find many more similarities in the syntax of c# to other languages than you will with vb.

Do you have access to the visual studio ide though? That makes it especially easy with the intellisense.

Also, you can approach learning it in many ways. If you want simple code behind programming with c# for asp.net web pages you can use it very modular like. If you want to learn OOP you can use it for that and start there with traditional console apps too.

Sorry for all the separate posts. Trying to add some value while trying to get to 50 post count for the classifieds so I can post a comment.

btw I've been programming for 10 years. Started c# when in beta 1

 

[PTNL]

Sorry for all the separate posts. Trying to add some value while trying to get to 50 post count for the classifieds so I can post a comment.

PM a mod or make a post in the Forum Help and Feedback area instead. The rules and that forum are there for a reason. Single sentence ramblings just to pad your post count is obnoxious.

 

[BillNutz]

Well mono emulates .net code in non windows environment, so what is it then? It's certainly not running natively, and there is a lot of overhead, not to mention not everything is guaranteed to work, as they basically had to recode .net and try to be as close as possible to MS.

Mono is the opensource implementation of Microsoft's CLI specifications, MS version is called the CLR.
Mono is native to nix OSes. I believed there is an MS implementation for FreeBSD also.
If you know how .NET or even Java works, you wouldn't use the word "emulates"...