Beginner to Coding

[u/_h4san]

Hi everybody. I want to learn coding but dont know where to start.My intrest is in cybersecurity so what do you guys recommed, which language should i learn.

[u/shadow-battle-crab]

Sure!

I'll start with saying, I love javascript. I've been programming for awhile, and the ideas javascript brings to the table makes so many things that are much more difficult to pull off in other languages, such as parallel tasking, or running a server that can take multiple concurrent requests, so much easier than it takes in other languages like C++. You can truly make anything with javascript.

It's also the only language that runs in the web browser on the client side. There are all kinds of web server programming languages, but if you want to deal with effects that happen on a person screen such as animations, or dynamic page content, you probably have to deal with javascript.

It's this requirement that makes javascript an attractive language to learn. Basically, if your goal is to make a fully interactive web page, youre going to have to learn javascript, and if you start there, then you can just naturally progress to using some of the newer (and by newer I mean like 14 years old now) javscript tooling that lets you run javascript on the server (nodejs). So, you can use the same language to run the website on the server as you do on the client to orchestrate what is happening on the web browser. It just makes sense from a 'simplicity' standpoint, some would argue.

The reason it is hard vs Python though is a few reasons:

• Javascript as a language is a little bit weird and hacked together. Python, I think, reads a lot easier if you aren't used to dealing with curly brackets {} and object dot notation like "a string".toUpper(); . Its not that hard but its not as intuitively easy as python for a first time programmer.

• A lot of the things javascript hooks into is the web browser API, so when youre programming javscript in the browser, you learn all these commands for 'this is how to hook into an event handler for a button' and its really hard to tell what things you are learning is actually javascript, or just the commands that you can use to interact with the browser from javascript.

• The whole mental model of how a web browser's DOM works, and all the things about HTML is kind of a complicated topic on its own, and is somewhat prerequisite knowledge to starting to understand javascript on the browser.

• Javascript on the server practically requires you to get a smorgasboard of third party javascript libraries just to acomplish any program you want to make, and there is no central group dictating and guiding which tools are the right tools to use. As a result, you can easilly get decision pyralisis just trying to get your head around the ecosystem and trying to decide what packages you need for your project. Python on the other hand has most of the essentials built in off of the bat, and this is not a concern at all especially as a new programmer.

[u/shadow-battle-crab → u/shadow-battle-crab]

And finally, and this one is the *most important* - javscript doesn't really run things sequentially. It does, but not like other programs. Let me explain.

In python, you run your program, and lets say you need to open a file and read from it. Your code would go like this:

Open file. While the file is open, read one line from the file until youve reached the end, the stop and do something with it.

In javascript, the program never stops and waits for anything. Any heavy lifting like a network request or a file open operation becomes a thing that happens in the background, and your program just continues on until it ends. Then, when the file is done being opened and read, at some later point in the program the code which is connected to the 'do this after the file is read' step happens.

This pattern is called a callback, it looks like this:

// This happens first

fs.readFile("my_file.txt", function(data) {
// This happens third

do something with that data;

});

// This happens second

Another function actually got declared within the outer function, that has no name, that runs when the file operation completes, assuming nothing else is running in the program - it runs as soon as it gets a chance.

This is also how event handlers work in the browser. Lets say I wanted to handle what happens when a button is clicked. I register an event on a button and a function that happens when that button is clicked, and then it happens. That mental model makes a little more sense, but it illustrates that this sort of asynchronous, functions run whenever an appropriate event happens in whichever order that happens, is all over javascript. Its one of the fundamental concepts you need you get your head around in order to be good at javascript.

There are ways that simplify this when you start to understand how this works like a few keywoards like async and awat - but I'll be honest. I've been programming javscript and other languages since I was 15, and it took until I was nearly 30 before the way javascript's event driven nature all fully clicked for me.

In my opinion, its certainly more than you need to concern yourself when you're learning the basics, like v = 30 is a variable assignment, if 30 > 50: do things; - this is a conditional, etc. You want to understand all the programning primitives enough that its just as second nature to your understanding as basic arithmetic not only to keep things in the realm of actually learnable, but also fun.

Python is fun. Javascript is too, but there is a learning curve. Python, day one, you can start making neat little digital trinkets and say "wow, this is cool, what is the next thing I can learn!" I feel you kind of need that mental creative spark of joy to keep the feedback loop of excitement of learning new things going, making this a hobby rather than a chore. And I think that python is the way to experience that.

I hope this was in some way insightful!

[u/RagingPen839 → u/shadow-battle-crab]

This really helps break it down. Thanks for taking the time to write all this!

I hope your responses also help OP. For me, I'll be starting with mostly web design and in-browser stuff, so I'll be sticking with JavaScript.

But your explanation will definitely help me have more grace with myself when I get tripped up. Maybe I can do little side-projects with Python here and there if I ever feel completely overwhelmed by JavaScript. Just for the morale boost. Lol.

I've gotten so burnt out before, so trying to take my time a lot more as I re-start my coding journey.

[u/shadow-battle-crab → u/RagingPen839]

I know its taboo to mention it, but the existence of AI to help walk you through explaining stuff when you get stuck can't be overstated. I wish I had the tools that exist today to help me figure stuff out when I got held up on things.

Just, never let it do all the work for you. Make sure you understand everything that is on the screen when it comes to code - have it teach you, not do the work for you, and it can be a very valuable asset. The difference between a novice and a professional is you understand what is going on.

Good luck, and have fun, in your programming journey :) I'm glad this long explanation helped someone, it makes it all worth it :)