Programin n Jammin....

[Jukuren]

So here is the deal.... im 26 years old and i have been talking about going back to school for some time now to study programming. But between a full time job, wife, kid and my house i dont really have the money to do so at the moment. But im tired of waiting... just because i cant go to school doesnt mean i can start start learning> But im not really sure where to start. I know there are a few programmers here on the forums so if i can just get a good starting point to study that would be kick ass........ thanks

[cmhardw]

There has got to be a book or resource written for people in your situation. I am self studying to become an actuary by going through study manuals that I purchase from a company called Actex. I would look around for some materials relevant to you. Are you planning to take any particular certification test at some point? Try starting with a study manual that helps you prepare for that test. Also, see if you can get ahold of a syllabus from the classes you would have taken and start with their book list. Just some ideas.

Self study ftw. I hate school (for myself, not for others). I need a self paced environment to really feel like I learn things. I get too stressed in a traditional classroom environment.

[BigSams]

I'm only a high school senior so maybe I don't have enough experience to give the advice but: yeah research materials and get some solid books that together treat both theory and has a plethora of thinking problems. Have to read and work through them thoroughly. Can't be lazy; you have to set up a schedule and stick with it.
I've been reading some of Knuth's first 3 volumes of "Art of Computer Programming" recently - hardcore stuff, I have to read really slowly, but people that have read a lot of it say it helped them.

[steph1389]

Programming languages arnt that hard to grasp but i personal think the best way to learn is to find a simple example of what you want (eg. HTML=webpage). After that mess around with the inputs and tags or whatever else and see what you come out with.

I learnt full HTML and CSS in this way in about a month and soon to start learning C.

[y3k9]

I'm still in middle school but quite coincidently I've been learning to program (during the winter break). I've started learning python (I seriously had 0 experience beforehand). I just went down to the library picked up a for dummies book and started learning off of youtube (it's really easy to learn off of the tutorials there). I started learning python because I heard it was easy to understand (and it is really) but I don't know if you should start off with it, but it is quite easy. Happy learning.

EDIT:
If you decide to learn off of youtube learn from this guy: http://www.youtube.com/user/thenewboston?blend=1&ob=4 He has a good teaching style and has tutorials for many programming languages.

[Rorix]

Stanford University have freely available videos of their CS106A course, which is Programming Methodology. It's a Java course for people with no prior experience in programming. You can download it from iTunes.

[cmhardw]

The MIT Open Courseware seems to have some stuff on programming. I found this on programming in C.

[jms_gears1]

http://www.youtube.com/user/thenewboston?blend=1&ob=4[/url] He has a good teaching style and has tutorials for many programming languages.

This times 1000. Bucky is a great teacher.

[y3k9]

This times 1000. Bucky is a great teacher.

I love his examples and stuff.

[Erzz]

I feel this is on topic. When I graduate high school I'm going to Dalhousie to study Computer Science, with a specialization in either gaming or security. I want to start learning programming language now, but I don't know which language(s) they'll teach there. Anyone have ideas on which language(s) I should learn?