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Programming is too HARD!!!

Started by tmg Jun 2, 2002 at 10:42 PM 82 replies 4.4k views

Original Post

Jun 2, 2002 at 10:42 PM

I''m trying, I really am. But it seems that I can''t do programming. I mean, I really want to learn, It''s just that I would rather do Game Programming than Normal Programming. I guess I am just an impatient person when it comes to learning a new langauge, I reckon I am too anxious to bother learning, and just be a porfessional right away. Well stuff it! If I can''t be a professional programmer then I guess that I''ll have to learn! Anyway, C++ can''t be THAT hard. I''ll think of it as another langauge. All langauges take a while to learn, so I know that as soon as I learn all of the classes, definitions, and what header files I should include, (there is other stuff, but there''s too much to remember), then I can go about making my own game, or modify someone elses, like DOOM, I''d like to add to or modify that engine, hmmm... I think I am gonna go and do some coding now. ____________________________ Everyone says that the world is corrupt. The World inside my head is more peaceful than this one.

Name-ing-Way

Jun 2, 2002 at 11:05 PM

What a dumb and pointless thread...

freakchild

Jun 2, 2002 at 11:16 PM

quote:
Original post by Name-ing-Way
What a dumb and pointless thread...

Agreed...all that energy spent ranting and raving could be used learning to program.

It''s no so black and white as ''you either have it or you don''t'' but different people manage with programming in different ways and some won''t cut it, either through incorrect aptitude or attitude. Even then bear in mind, you can be the best programmer in the world but looking at a screen and typing all day can be a very hard way to make a living.

Still, no point in getting frustrated. People wanting to get into the industry should explore all avenues. It''s not just about programming.

Xero-X2

Jun 2, 2002 at 11:19 PM

Is it just me or did he tmg just answer him self?

George2

Jun 3, 2002 at 2:09 AM

It''s not that hard !

George2

Jun 3, 2002 at 2:09 AM

It''s not that hard !

Advanced Bug

Jun 3, 2002 at 3:18 AM

quote:
Original post by tmg
I''m trying, I really am. But it seems that I can''t do programming.

Aren''t you trying to learn Object Oriented Programming (classes, member functions, abstractions, etc.)? I am not a beginner, but whenever I try to do OOP, I start to think something like that. I just get lost in an infinite number of choices (to which object does this function belongs, should this be public or private, can I use templates here, and so on). But when I switch back to procedural (modular, non-OOP, C-style) programming, everything goes normal again. Many problems still are relatively hard, but they are solvable and there is limited number of design options.

KalvinB

Jun 3, 2002 at 4:05 AM

Not everyone can be a programmer. If it''s not working out for you and you don''t believe it ever will, get a new hobby. The sooner you find your "thing" the better off you''ll be.

It took me a year to finish my first big game (Cradle Quest 1) which was written in QuickBASIC. Everything I know about QuickBASIC is in that game. Before I started, I didn''t know the first thing on how to complete it. And it took another year to complete CQ2 and that was in Visual Basic. A couple years later I coded both CQ1 and CQ2 for the TI-85 (both graphical) in less than a month. Using QuickBASIC forced me to optimize my code. CQ1 actually ended up using the maximum number of lines of code that QB 4.5 could handle.

It''s going to take a long time to make your first game but the more you put into it the first time around, the better you''re going to be the second time around. I still use the concepts from those first two games in far more sophisticated projects using C++ and DirectX. From all my previous experience, I get things done much quicker. You have to crawl before you can walk. And you have to walk before you can run.

Game Programming is just Normal Programming but with a more interesting interface. Stick with it and in a few years you''ll be good at it. Or, find something else that''ll hold your interest better.

Ben

IcarusIndie.com [ The Rabbit Hole | The Labyrinth | Programming | Gang Wars | The Wall | Hosting]

davidsporn

Jun 3, 2002 at 4:35 AM

Hi,

According to me, 2 things make programming a game to seem being too hard (sorry for my bad english..) :
- The game to do is too much ambitious ("my game will be THE game of the millenium")
- The amount of code necessary to display a simple picture, or playing a sound

I needed three or four attempt to catch how to write a dummy Win32 app, and as it''s a hobby, it took me two or three years to achieve this dummy app. Then I need again 2-3 attempt to catch how DirectX work, it took me one-two years. Fortunately, I could catch how to use OpenGL at the first attempt, thanks to Nehe Tutorial.

To conclude, it''s not that programming is too hard, it''s that all the code that is not directly related with what you want to do is quite huge at the beginning.

So be brave !

----
David Sporn AKA Sporniket

Dean Harding

Jun 3, 2002 at 4:47 AM

quote:
Original post by KalvinB
Not everyone can be a programmer.

I totally agree with this statement. I don''t think it''s got to do with your intelligence (though being smart does help) I think it''s got to do with the way you think. If you can''t think like a computer, it''s very difficult to program one.

Sure it''s possible, I see lots of people at my school struggling away with programming never really "get"ing it. They still pass. For me, though, I never go to lectures, I only go to tutorials where they take your name down, and I still get a credit average.

There was a Dilbert thing once, where he was talking about the "nack". Some people are technically-minded, other''s aren''t.

codeka.com - Just click it.

RipTorn

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:18 AM

I think it was my current cosc lecturer that said:
"if you don''t have the desire to program you might as well just quit right now, you''ll be wasting your time otherwise"
That extends to difficulty. Programming is all about solving problems, and the problems are always going to be difficul. If you don''t have the desire to solve those problems, and would rather just give up, then you never can be a truly good programmer. All the satisfaction you get in programming comes from solving problems.

I think those people who are natural programmers will discover programming naturally. It''s not really something you can force upon yourself.

AxoDosS

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:18 AM

Hi!

This isnt hard

  
#include <stdio.h>

void main()
{
printf("Hello World\n");
}

Alimonster

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:21 AM

Tsk tsk. If you were writing in C, then you shouldn''t have () as the parameter for main, it should be (void). () represents any (unknown) types as parameters, IIRC (which I probably don''t). If you were programming in C++ then you''d want to #include <cstdio> instead of <stdio.h>. Also, you should probably have main as returning an int (usually 0).

Programming is easy and fun!

AxoDosS

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:24 AM

Lets do everything we can to kepp the code simple in the beginning.

(MSVC)

Alimonster

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:26 AM

I found this cool Hello World program (don''t know if it compiles and it''s probably in C):

  /*
 * HELLO WORLD program
 * by Jack Applin and Robert Heckendorn, 1985
 * (Note: depends on being able to modify elements of argv[],
 * which is not guaranteed by ANSI and often not possible.)
 */
main(v,c)char**c;{for(v[c++]="Hello, world!\n)";
(!!c)[*c]&&(v--||--c&&execlp(*c,*c,c[!!c]+!!c,!c));
**c=!c)write(!!*c,*c,!!**c);}

AxoDosS

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:46 AM

Ohh brother!!

Much ado about nothing!?
Maybe your the expert, I dont know but the code will work.
It is the basic code you will find in most books about C++.
Yes there are 1752 diffirent ways of making a simple "Hello World" program. This is one of them. Im not saying that this one is the best but it is one of the 1752 ways.

henrym

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:48 AM

My older brother pointed that out to me this very day...

He told me that I haven''t really been programming, I''ve just been playing round with specific APIs when the timing(and my interest) suit it. It really opened my eyes about what I have been doing for the last 5 months.

He also explained to me that programming was really about thinking about problems in a whole new way...
He showed me Tadao Takaoka''s homepage(a lecturer at one of the universities near me, I suspect thats where RipTorn goes?) and set me on implementing some of the algos.

Henrym

Rickmeister

Jun 3, 2002 at 5:52 AM

Game programming isn''t hard.. You just have to start out with some simple project.. Trying to make Doom XI as your first game is just plain stupid.. Look at this GREAT Tetris tutorial and learn from it...

Programming overall isn''t that hard either... You just have to move chunks of memory back and forth...The trick is to know which part of the memory to move, and where to move it....

#define Email Lex & Yacc Function Pointers Virtual Terrain Knowledge Base Real Programmers
"Strong typing is for the weak minded!"

Alimonster

Jun 3, 2002 at 6:02 AM

While we''re on the subject of ridiculously obfuscated code...

  

				char rahc
				   [ ]
				    =
				  "\n/"
				    ,
				redivider
				   [ ]
				    =
		       "Able was I ere I saw elbA"
				    ,
				    *
			     deliver,reviled
				    =
				   1+1
				    ,
			       niam ; main
				   ( )
				  {/*\}
				   \*/
				 int tni
				    =
				   0x0
				    ,
			     rahctup,putchar
				   ( )
		           ,LACEDx0 = 0xDECAL,
				rof ; for
			     (;(int) (tni);)
			       (int) (tni)
			  = reviled ; deliver =
				redivider
				    ;
for ((int)(tni)++,++reviled;reviled* *deliver;deliver++,++(int)(tni)) rof
			            =
			     (int) -1- (tni)
		          ;reviled--;--deliver;
			     (tni)  =  (int)
			  - 0xDECAL + LACEDx0 -
				rof ; for
       (reviled--,(int)--(tni);(int) (tni);(int)--(tni),--deliver)
			    rahctup = putchar
			   (reviled* *deliver)
				    ;
			    rahctup * putchar
			    ((char) * (rahc))
				    ;
				   /*\
				  {\*/}

  

#define _ -F<00||--F-OO--;
int F=00,OO=00;main(){F_OO();printf("%1.3f\n",4.*-F/OO/OO);}F_OO()

{
            _-_-_-_
       _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
    _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
  _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
 _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
 _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
 _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
 _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
  _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
    _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
        _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
            _-_-_-_
}

  

char*lie;

	double time, me= !0XFACE,

	not; int rested,   get, out;

	main(ly, die) char ly, **die ;{

	    signed char lotte,


dear; (char)lotte--;

	for(get= !me;; not){

	1 -  out & out ;lie;{

	char lotte, my= dear,

	**let= !!me *!not+ ++die;

	    (char*)(lie=


"The gloves are OFF this time, I detest you, snot\n\0sed GEEK!");

	do {not= *lie++ & 0xF00L* !me;

	#define love (char*)lie -

	love 1s *!(not= atoi(let

	[get -me?

	    (char)lotte-


(char)lotte: my- *love -
	
	''I''  -  *love -  ''U'' -

	''I''  -  (long)  - 4 - ''U'' ])- !!
	
	(time  =out=  ''a''));} while( my - dear

	&& ''I''-1l  -get-  ''a''); break;}}

	    (char)*lie++;


(char)*lie++, (char)*lie++; hell:0, (char)*lie;

	get *out* (short)ly   -0-''R''-  get- ''a''^rested;

	do {auto*eroticism,

	that; puts(*( out

	    - ''c''
	
-(''P''-''S'') +die+ -2 ));}while(!"you''re at it");


for (*((char*)&lotte)^=

	(char)lotte; (love ly) [(char)++lotte+

	!!0xBABE];){ if (''I'' -lie[ 2 +(char)lotte]){ ''I''-1l ***die; }

	else{ if (''I'' * get *out* (''I''-1l **die[ 2 ])) *((char*)&lotte) -=

	''4'' - (''I''-1l); not; for(get=!


get; !out; (char)*lie  &  0xD0- !not) return!!

	(char)lotte;}


(char)lotte;

	do{ not* putchar(lie [out

	*!not* !!me +(char)lotte]);

	not; for(;!''a'';);}while(

	    love (char*)lie);{


register this; switch( (char)lie

	[(char)lotte] -1s *!out) {

	char*les, get= 0xFF, my; case'' '':

	*((char*)&lotte) += 15; !not +(char)*lie*''s'';

	this +1s+ not; default: 0xF +(char*)lie;}}}

	get - !out;

	if (not--)

	goto hell;

	    exit( (char)lotte);}

(All properties of their respective owners, of course.)

I have nothing more to add to this conversation - carry on!

AxoDosS

Jun 3, 2002 at 6:38 AM

Hehe nice!

Peace be whit you

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