java beginner

[Jacob thomas]

hi...
i am beginner to java...i really want to learn java,but don't know where to start .i am not soo confident about C .will i be able to learn java.if soo how to start.Please help me doing this.
thanks

[Stan James]

Hi, welcome aboard! You couldn't have picked a better place to start your quest.

Sun's Tutorials are good, and Thinking In Java is a very readable book - free online. The gang will surely chime in with more recommendations.

Browse around and learn to use the Ranch, too. It works best when you've taken a shot at something and gotten stuck. If you can post a short chunk of "almost working" code and a question that focuses sharply on what doesn't work we'll try to get you unstuck.

Have fun with Java!

[marc weber]

"joy cool,"

Welcome to JavaRanch!

Please revise your display name to meet the JavaRanch Naming Policy. To maintain the friendly atmosphere here at the ranch, we like folks to use real (or at least real-looking) names, with a first and a last name.

You can edit your name here.

Thank you for your prompt attention, and enjoy the ranch!

-Marc

PS: I definitely agree with Stan's recommendations of Sun's tutorials and Eckel's Thinking in Java. In addition to downloading TIJ using Stan's link, there's also an an online version that I find convenient.

[Nicholas Carrier]

Head First java second edition is the way to go to learn. I loved it and it made everything extremely clear.

[Jeff Albertson]

Originally posted by joy cool:
i am not soo confident about C .

As someone who started off in C and who kissed the ground like the old pope when I realized how much cleaner Java was than C++, let me suggest that you don't worry about C. Some people hold the opinion that you should first learn to program in a lower level language -- program "close to the metal" -- but I've never understood that. Maybe it's because I come to programming from mathematics, but I'm happy with working with abstractions. I don't see why I need to think of code as something that runs on a physical machine. But in any case, C is full of so many issues that are irrelevant to Java -- preprocessor macros and pointer arithmetic and malloc/free... you'd be wasting time that would be better spent learning Java.

[Stuart Ash]

Originally posted by Jeff Albrechtsen:


As someone who started off in C and who kissed the ground like the old pope when I realized how much cleaner Java was than C++, let me suggest that you don't worry about C. Some people hold the opinion that you should first learn to program in a lower level language -- program "close to the metal" -- but I've never understood that. Maybe it's because I come to programming from mathematics, but I'm happy with working with abstractions. I don't see why I need to think of code as something that runs on a physical machine. But in any case, C is full of so many issues that are irrelevant to Java -- preprocessor macros and pointer arithmetic and malloc/free... you'd be wasting time that would be better spent learning Java.

Yes, in a way, you should be glad you don't have to go thru all that's troublesome in C/C++.

Imagine what C-beginners were told -- you should've done some assembly programming!!

The optimist view is:

a. If you learned Java starting off at the C-level, and wading thru C++, well and good!

b. If you are starting to plunge into Java directly, well and good!



All the best!