We will use a real world programming language for this course. I know I said that programming logic is the most important thing, we will use pseudocode, and yadda, yadda, yadda. But let's be honest, writing a bunch os pseudocode exercises without ever running a program is pretty boring. You want to see the practical results of your brain exercises. And I think it is useful to learn some programming logic concepts and apply them right away in translating your pseudocode into a computer program. This is precious practice.
If you want to practice your programming logic in a visual and entertaining way, you can also check out MIT's Scratch, a project developed at MIT to teach programming logic to children (and everyone else). It is pretty fun and it is used worldwide to teach anyone interested in learning how to program.
We will use Javascript here for a series of reasons. At the time of this writing:
- Javascript is a VERY popular language. Actually it is the most popular language for GitHub projects;
- Javascript is the only language that can run in every major Internet browser;
- The most popular and modern Internet front end libraries are made in Javascript;
- Professionals that are proficient in these libraries and Javascript are in very high demand;
- There are Javascript tools to create native smarphone and tablet apps;
- There are technologies to build fully fledged desktop applications in Javascript for Mac OSX, Windows, and Linux;
- Node.js is a very popular platform that leverages Javascript to create server side applications for Mac, Windows and Linux;
- Javascript is used to create applications in any domain, from large scale business applications, to graphics programming, to game programming;
- There are many tools and libraries freely available for Javascript and many development tools use Javascript as the main language not only for development but also for deployment automation;
- There is a lot of free material on the Internet to learn and practice with Javascript.
Bonus reason: JavaScript Object Notation (Json) has become the de facto standard to transfer data in distributed applications on the Internet. From web services to security tokens, Json also is everywhere. You will have to learn it anyway and, as the name implies, it originated and is natively used in JavaScript.
The Java language was originally created to be mutliplaform. "Write once, run everywhere!" was its moto. Apparently, these days, Javascript is getting much closer to fulfill this role.
Research:
Find on the Internet what:
- are single page applications (SPAs) and what Javascript based products can be used to create them;
- are native mobile applications and what Javascript based products can be used to create them;
- is web applications deployment automation and what Javascript based products ca be used to do it;
- are desktop applications and what Javascript products can be used to create them.
Tip: Wikipedia is a great resource to explain in high level how things work. You may Google to find a technoogy or product first, and then search that product it on Wikipedia to understand how it works without being bombarded by marketing and techie nonsense.