What Should I Learn Next?
Community Forums/General Help/What Should I Learn Next?
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| These days I feel I have an okay grasp of BlitzMax. I'll keep using it but I want to try others paths as well. When it comes to computer science my main interests (other then games) are networking and AI. I'd also like to understand computer science principles more. Memorizing a new syntax for the same kind of output doesn't seem very exciting to me. What should I start studying to help me understand not just different forms, but more importantly, new concepts? Thanks! |
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| Lisp. Unquestionably, Lisp. It will redefine what programming can and should be, in your mind. It will make you realize that Python, Ruby, C#.. they are all still playing catchup to Lisp, and yet they'll never be able to match the beauty of Lisp because of the way Lisp's syntax allows it to work and allows you to program at a meta-level. And when you can compile function by function, and test things on the fly - not to mention teh option of including a full run-time compiler in any program allowing you to debug a running program/compile and redefine parts of a running program (great for servers, obviously) - you'll never want to go back to anything else. It's really hard to put into words all of why Lisp is so different and why it will expand your programming horizons. You just have to spend some time learning it and suddenly the doors it opens will become apparent. Here are some great and free online books. Successful Lisp http://psg.com/~dlamkins/sl/contents.html Practical Common Lisp http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/ If you just take the time to read through the first 3 chapters of Practical Common Lisp, you'll get a glimpse of why Lisp is so powerful. That really is just a glimpse, though. I'd recommend starting with Practical Common Lisp and using Successful Lisp to augment what you learned in PCL. Enjoy! :) |
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| Surely it should be called 'Lithp'? :D |
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| See your Lisp, and raise you Haskell. |
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| If I had time to do any programming at all right now I'd really like to learn Haskell myself. Of course, there's still so much in Lisp I don't know, but Haskell and OCaml look interesting. |
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