[geeks] Introductory programming language?

[Phil Stracchino]

On 08/30/11 23:13, Mouse wrote:
> She is entirely (for these purposes) a Windows user.  So, I'm looking
> for a language that has decent implementations for both Unices and
> Windows, with the former open-source and the latter gratis or cheap -
> that part isn't that hard - and is suitable as a first language for an
> introduction to programming.

> I'm not looking for hairy power or theoretical elegance here, or I'd be
> going with C or Lisp or some such; I'm looking for (a) simple, but not
> dumbed down to the point of being unable to do basic things and (b)
> powerful enough to do minimally useful things relatively easily, so as
> to get that "hey, I got something working!" buzz.  I think awk was a
> good choice, and if there's a decent implementation for Windows I'll be
> tempted to go that route again.  But it occurs to me that there may
> well be better languages out there.
> 
> Any thoughts?

Perl?  There's no reason why perfectly functional Perl code *has* to
look like line noise.

Maybe Python?  There is a Visual Studio extension for Python now.


-- 
  Phil Stracchino, CDK#2     DoD#299792458     ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
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