The Programming Thread (was New to Programming)

[Brad]

You may as well use C# though no? Genuine question, I'm not up to speed on either.

[bcass]

Yeah, C# would be my preference but performance wise there's not much in it for most operations between VB.NET and C#. VB.NET has a lot more syntactic sugar so is probably easier to learn.

[Brad]

Gotcha. I guess there's room for both then.

[bcass]

Microsoft have to be commended for opening up their platforms to a new generation of bedroom coders. I recently learned that the guy who created XNA is the guy who created the Allegro library for C++. Really, they couldn't have hired a better person for the job. XNA does feel like the natural progression of Allegro.

[hudson]

The Programming Thread (was New to Programming)

Dear Gamesmaster, I have no programming skills whatsoever. I have dabbled in HTML in the past, I know "pffffffft".

Anyway, with that in mind, I would like to know where to begin in developing a Facebook app and hopefully a phone app too. I imagine there is no quick solution, but some guidance would be appreciated.

The app sounds simple, without giving too much away, I want to be able to create lists, which can be edited by multiple users.

Thanks

[Brad]

*steals incredible idea of having a list of things*

more useful info to follow when I have a bit more time i.e. this evening probably.

[hudson]

The Programming Thread (was New to Programming)

*steals incredible idea of having a list of things*

more useful info to follow when I have a bit more time i.e. this evening probably.

Arr, thanks Gamesmaster.

* hides Listoids

[bcass]

Not familiar with Facebook app development, but for mobile phones you only really have two choices - Android (which uses Java) and iOS (which uses Objective-C). Java is far easier to learn than Objective-C, which I wouldn't recommend as a beginner language as it'll probably put you off programming forever. Actually, there may be a 3rd choice - HTML5/JavaScript - this will give you cross-platform support, but you'll probably take a big performance hit running HTML5 on phones, and JavaScript isn't as nice as Java IMO, so I'd still go for Android.

[Duncan James Waugh]

There's also Qt which is C++ based and supported on nearly everything including PCs (all flavours), Android, iPhone, Blackberry 10 and Meego. It has a markup language called QML which is very beginner friendly, which for simpler applications you can use without having to learn any C++ For example all these demos were done without having to learn any C++:

[hudson]

Thanks so far, guys. A long shot, but are there any wysiwyg type tools I could use?

[Brad]

Well for iOS you can kind of draw your application in interface builder and then just fill in the code bits if you like.

Objective-C (iOS development) only seems complicated to those who already know C, C++, Java because it does things a but different. I imagine that to a non-coder it's no more difficult to learn than Java is and it has a number of benefits IMO but when it comes to languages, everyone has their own opinion.

[bcass]

Well for iOS you can kind of draw your application in interface builder and then just fill in the code bits if you like.

You can do something similar with the Android SDK in Eclipse, but it's not really the best way of approaching game development IMO.

Also, there's no way Objective-C is easier to learn than Java. There's a reason why Java is the primary language being taught at most universities these days.

[Brad]

He didn't mention game development. He wants a list that multiple people can update. Maybe that's going to form part of a game though I suppose.

I don't know about Java being the primary language taught at universities. Where have you got those stats from? What courses are we talking about etc. There's a damn good reason why Obj-C isn't taught and that's because it's extremely niche.

EDIT: I agree in general about not drawing an application though. Doesn't really teach you anything and when something goes wrong you're well and truly stuck.

[bcass]

Java being the most popular language at universities is an assumption I make based on three things - the well-known and well-documented fact that it's become so dominant in industry (world-wide), it's high ranking on the TIOBE index (2nd only to C), and my own experience within academia in the UK (I'm a contractor within that field). The disparity between computer science at A-level and computer science related subjects at uni is so great that most UK universities assume no prior programming knowledge, so start with Java, because that's where most of the jobs are and is probably the easiest OO language out there.

Also, Objective-C is anything but niche. It currently stands at no.3 on the TIOBE index.

[Duncan James Waugh]

A little off topic perhaps but certainly in the south of the UK I've never noticed Java as being particularly popular in job requirements outside of Android. The overwhelming majority at the businesses at career fairs were looking for C++ or C# roles.