Questions for all programmers willing to help a beginner

[Ioannis Vranos]

On Tue, 2010-04-27 at 19:41 +0300, Daniel wrote:
> Hello first of all. I'm very happy that I can write this email and I
> kindly ask for your help in my problem. I sat down and thought today
> about my future dream of becoming a programmer. I love very much
> Gnu/linux, I'm very enthusiastic when it comes to computers in
> generally, I help everyone as much as I can. I don't know I breath and
> live with computers 24/7. I go to bad, and can't wait to wake up to
> start learning something new every day when it comes to them. I want
> to make a career in programming. Not for the money, I don't want a
> super high speed car or a fancy home and such things like that. I only
> want to be able to feed myself and have a roof under my head, and live
> as modestly as possible but contribute to the gnu/linux and free
> software world as much as I can. I'm a beginner when it comes to
> programming languages. Right now I started learning python. I have to
> say that I know very little about programming languages but I try and
> learn every day to move on and finally be at the point were I can
> write some real programs and hack/improve free software. I have this
> feeling of I don't know, accomplishment when looking at source code,
> thou I don't understand all of it, yet. I love very much this
> area(programming) and I feel that I want to dedicate my life to it. I
> am very seriously, I read a lot, and I can say with all of my heart
> that I love this and I am very enthusiastic. But I want to ask you
> something. I know this isn't enough and I am wondering what qualities
> does a programmer need to have in order to be one. And also I kindly
> ask for you to give me some advices, hints or anything that may be
> suitable for me in my future career.
> 
> I wish you everyone the best and thanks.


"Programming" is a vast area. One can program from small embedded
devices to large mainframes. Also one can become a "web developer", or
program "web-centric" applications.


The long term future may be around "web-centric" applications. Also the
subject of programming is diverse. There is game development, database
development, etc.


Find what you like and learn it.


My suggestion is, try to avoid vendor lock-ins, like one-company
programming languages.


Prefer standardised languages and open-source languages.