Re: Getting started with C++
On 11/11/2012 2:28 AM, Swifty wrote:
What would people recommend for someone wishing to learn C++ ?
I've used a variety of different languages over the past 45 years, but
haven't successfully tackled a new language in over 25 years (fading
brain syndrome).
My needs are probably quite simple. At the moment, I'm looking at
creating an exe that exits with a return code of 1/0 based on whether or
not ::GetForegroundWindow() returns null.
Once I have some C++ skills, I'll start using something like Visual C++
I'm not fishing for an actual program ??? helpful people have always come
to my rescue over the years, but I'll never learn this way!
Try a decent book, it might prove useful. I recommend "Accelerated C++"
by Koenig and Moo, and the success might depend on what languages you
already know. Twenty-five years ago the popular ones were C, Basic,
Fortran (IV and 77), PL/I (on mainframes, probably), Cobol, Pascal
(colleges?), Algol-68, Simula, Lisp... (what am I forgetting?) Which
environment are you coming from?
<nonCPPspecific>
At the same time you might want to get a book by Petzold to lean Windows
programming (if that's what you want).
You don't have to wait to "have some C++ skill" to start using Visual
C++ environment. In fact, you might want to start with Visual Studio
just to get your feet wet. Get a book for learning it. The VC++ book
does not have to be the newest, in fact getting an older book will save
you some money and will force you to explore the current tool to find
out the differences between the book and the tool.
</nonCPPspecific>
Ask specific questions if you have any.
V
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