Languages

On your development journey, there will be a lot to learn, but don’t be overwhelmed! There are so many resources everwhere for your questions or problems. All you have to do is find something you want to make, then learn what you need to make it. It’s as simple as that.

If you are a complete beginner and want to have a more comprehensive introduction to computer science, you should check out Harvard’s CS50 course!

What is a programming language?

A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs.

There are many of them, each one with different characteristics like performance, syntax, paradigm, types, etc. Each language can accomplish very different things, but most of them have similarities that allow programmers to learn another language pretty easily.

List of Commonly Used Languages

• Python: easy to learn, fun and practical to write, used for data science, web apps, server-side scripting

• JavaScript: very common in web development, typically paired with HTML and CSS to build websites, TypeScript transpiles to JS and provides type safety and better tooling

• Rust: highly performant and memory-safe, for building systems/apps that require amazing performance like game engines or operating systems

• C#: created for Microsoft’s .NET framework, used in game development with Unity, versatile for app development

• Java: heavily object-oriented, used for Android development, servers, and databases, becoming outdated so Kotlin is better!

• Swift: a powerful and modern language to develop for Apple platforms

• C/C++: the OG, low-level languages used to build blazingly fast applications like games, kernels, drivers, and operating systems, allowing fine control over memory and performance

Check out Fireship on Youtube! He has a collection of short videos about many different languages and tools: https://www.youtube.com/@Fireship.

freecodecamp has many Youtube video tutorials here. I would recommend starting out with their Python or JavaScript course.

Languages also typically come with a specific package manager like pip for Python, npm for JavaScript, and cargo for Rust. Packages will help you build apps with pre-existing tools and functions, so you won’t have to write your own libraries from scratch!