There are tons of programming languages around today, so choosing the best ones to learn can be daunting. Luckily, there are a few ways to narrow it down. Choosing a coding language (or a few languages) to learn has a lot to do with what you intend to do with them. The best choices for web development are different than those for desktop application building. Also, you need to take into account how much experience you have with programming. Some easier languages can accomplish the same tasks as others, without the added hassle of mastering a super-advanced code. In this article, we’ll give you a few examples of great programming languages for a variety of tasks, so you can choose the one that works best for your goals.
Web Development
Web development covers a variety of different activities, all of which come together to produce a website or web application. When choosing the best programming language to learn for building a website, there are a few things you need to consider. First, website building requires several steps, which include front end and back end development. In some cases, you may not need to do much back end programming, but it varies based on your website requirements.
The front end or ‘client side’ of a website is everything the user sees and interacts with. For this kind of programming, you only need some basic skills to get going. Coding languages such as HTML and JavaScript are the foundational choices for front end web development, and they’re considered some of the easiest programming languages to learn. As you advance, you’ll learn languages such as CSS, but you can start with HTML and JavaScript to build a working website.
Back end development requires slightly different skills. For ‘server side’ programming, you’ll need to learn advanced coding languages in addition to the basics. Common back end programming languages include Ruby (for Ruby-on-Rails), PHP, Java, and Python. Many people recommend learning Python early because it’s useful for much more than just one task.
Desktop Applications
With desktop applications, we see some parallels with back end web development. If you want to build computer software, you’ll need to learn advanced programming languages such as Java and C++. Depending on your operating system, other coding skills may be required to achieve the best results. You can also use SQL, Ruby, PHP, and even Python to create computer programs, but it all comes down to personal preference. Object-oriented coding languages like Python are useful because they make large coding projects more manageable and more organized.
iPhone or Android Mobile Apps
Mobile app development is a big business today, and there are quite a few useful languages to learn for this task. The language you choose will depend on what operating system you’re building for. Apple’s iOS devices are a pretty good bet for programming because Apple specifies a language for coding applications. They chose Swift as their primary language because it’s logical, intuitive, and extremely versatile. However, you can also choose another language like C++, C#, HTML5, or a combination of them. Android development is more flexible and offers several coding language options, as well. These include the versatile Python language, C++, C, Java, and Kotlin.
How to Learn Programming
Today, many education options exist for aspiring programmers. There’s a multitude of free online programming courses, many of which can be found on YouTube. If you want to work in a coding field and build a lucrative technology career, you can attend a coding bootcamp and learn everything you’ll need for an entry-level job in the industry. Coding bootcamps last between a few months and a year, and it’s a proven way to break into tech. If you’re ready to try programming for the first time, check out our basic HTML tutorial here and click the link below.
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