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Old 6th September 2008
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BuSerD BuSerD is offline
Real Name: Alejandro
Noob In Training
 
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Houston, TX
Posts: 14
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I signed up for 3 programming courses in college over one calendar year; Beginning C++, Advanced(not really) C++ and Java. Java gave me instant gratification because of the gui(s) that we'd also create with the applets but it always felt dirty to me. C++ felt different, cleaner and the gratification came from getting the most done with the least amount of code. My most memorable assignment was to create a virtual keyboard(C++ and Qt3). While the task only specified alpha-numeric keys I completed that in about 20 minutes with the help of ascii values so added more keys to address the everything other that the alt and control keys(i had no idea what they really did). My instructor was impressed with how much I had learned in a couple of weeks so my first computer related paid job was at my university as a jr programmer and professor's technical aid. I don't currently program all that much but all that learning is put use everyday via scripting. I am a technical support specialist(Windows, Redhat, CentOS and FreeBSD) in my day job so sed and awk is used for almost every investigation ticket that I address.

I never learned basic but did do visual basic programming for a year before i learned about open source/platforms. Trying to learn python and ruby now but in the end i'll choose one of the two based on it merit and use it for development of a couple of sites i have in mind. php is not in the running this time. Maybe later though.

PS. My wife (CS major) introduced me to C programming on FreeBSD at a local BUG about 8 years ago but I only use straight C when forced.
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