Another day and some progress. A Wiki has been started, groceries purchased and a Cordon Bleu lunch a week ahead of my birthday. Not a bad way for the day to go.
I think I’ve managed to read another page of a C++ book I borrowed from the library but I still feel pretty good about my progress. I can see how I could overuse that word, but it’s really been a concern of mine lately. I’ve read C++ books in the past but felt pretty overwhelmed. I also got distracted a bit by other things, namely video games.
Of course with me being ‘me’, I don’t tend to stay on one topic for too long. Something usually comes along and grabs my attention and I’ll be derailed by it for a while. I suppose that could be called fickle, but I like to think I’ll get back to it eventually.
About a year ago I knew that in order to actually accomplish ‘something’ soon I would need to pick up a programming language that I could start using now and not be treading water the whole time. I’d previously used batch scripting quite a bit (mediocre skill lvl) along with some Perl, Bash, VBScript and … well that’s probably it. I had gotten used to Perl but was overwhelmed with the, Tim Toady, philosophy.
That’s when I finally decided to learn Python. After a short time I was writing various utility scripts and felt like it wouldn’t be too much longer before I actually could write some serious apps. I came across a really cool podcast syndication script called synclosure that really encouraged me to keep at it. In fact I use a modified copy weekly to make sure a have a large collection of podcasts to choose from. Someday I hope to release the modified code base for others to benefit from. First I have to get a projects page going.
But about Python, I started towards a drive mapping script after about 3-4 months of minor scripting. Some would call this a minor script, but for me it certainly encouraged me to see it work like I designed it. Compared to Perl, Python is really a dream to work with. I really liked that Perl looked in so many ways like the C programming language, but after some time I began to see appreciate how clean and clear the Python syntax is.
Take this for example:
list = ['apple', 'orange', 'pear'] for list_item in list: print list_item
What does it do? Yeah, I know, rhetorical question. It prints out the three items, one per line.
The syntax reminds in ways of VBScript, Basic and other simple languages. Did you notice that the print statement was indented? Did you know that indentation is required? For Python it’s much like the braces are in Perl, C, C++, etc. Some call it a straight jacket, I call it consistency. Very useful when you go back to modify your code after weeks/months.
I had to do that recently with some of my older code. I was expecting to find a disaster, instead I was impressed with my work. I suppose that makes me a bit arrogant? 
But back to the point of this lengthy bit of rambling:
I set out to learn C++ but knew the journey was going to be a long one. So, I wisely learned Python first. While I was learning that I was using batch scripting and VBScript to handle actual tasks.
Oh, another reason I chose Python was so that I could use ‘one’ language everywhere: small minor scripts that I was previously using batch scripting for, and larger tasks where I was using shell scripting (GNU/Linux) or Perl (Windows, GNU/Linux). I wanted to quit having to swap syntax rules for things I chose to write myself.
With that said it sounds like I must have been busy with programming and would have come a long ways, right? Not quite. I have a weakness and it’s escaping ‘the real world’ at times by means of a great book series or an impressive PC game.
During the last year it’s been Dawn of War, Far Cry, Quake IV, Crysis, and lately The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. I’ve finally weaned myself back to once or twice a week.
About 3 or 4 months ago I started back on my journey to learn C++ and was making a little headway. That was until I purchased Oblivion. Wow. I won’t bother to try and review it as so many others have already done such a fantastic job. If you play it and you end up liking it, I have some bad news for you: There are dozens of cases of people logging over 200 hours in this game. Beware Oblivion. :O
It wasn’t until I came across a rather small C++ book at a local library (You Can Program in C++: A Programmer’s Introduction) and started reading it that I finally made up my mind: If I want to do this (and I finally made up my mind on that too), I have to get serious.
So, this blog, a newly installed wiki and lots of handwritten notes (both old and some new) are attempts to keep on track.
I just have to keep moving forward, even if the pace isn’t exactly warp speed.
