Five Questions That Can Help You Choose A Programming Language To Learn

Are you thinking about learning a new programming language?

It can be difficult to decide on what programming language to learn with so many options out there in the market.  Here are five questions you can ask yourself to help you decide what programming language might be best for your situation.

Why?

Before you make any decisions regarding what programming language you want to study it is a good idea to be able to answer why you want to learn a programming language in the first place.  Are you planning to learn how to program? If so, you may want to focus your search on programming languages that teach basic programming principles. Examples of such languages include Lisp, Scheme, Ruby and Smalltalk.

If you are looking to build your career, then you need to take market forces into consideration. To get a good feel for the market look at job ads that reflect the type of work you want to do, the experience level required, and most listed in the ads are the languages you should consider studying.

How?

How do you plan to learn the new language? Will you attend classes at a college, take an online course, or find a mentor?   How you plan to learn the language is important because in a face-to-face, or online class you have the experience and skills of the professor, or teacher to help you if you get stuck as well as the help of classmates.  If you choose to learn a programming language with the help of an online community be certain they welcome newcomers and provide the resources you will need to learn the language.

What Type of Support Does MY Programming Language Have?

Another thing to consider when choosing a programming language are resources and tools.  Make certain the programming language you choose to study has ample tools to support it including libraries and frameworks that support the applications you intend to use it for.  

What Will I Build With This Language?

The type of application you plan to build should influence the type of programming language you decide to learn. Not all programming languages are appropriate for all applications. To narrow down your options examine the work of developers and applications that are similar to what you want to build. Find out the languages those developers use and why they chose that language.  That information will give you better insight into what languages work best for your application.

Are You A Risk Taker?

There are several programming languages besides mainstream programming languages.  If you are not risk adverse or you are learning a programming language for personal development then choosing a less mainstream programming language may be more interesting. If you are choosing the language based on a career goal think about the consequences of choosing a non-mainstream programming language. Many development environments consider non-mainstream programming languages too risky and that can limit your career options. On the other hand, it can also open up opportunities as a specialist consultant.

Conclusion

When you identify the what, where, and how of learning a programming language it will help you focus in on the things that are most important in choosing the right programming language for your situation.  In the end it is most important that the programming language you choose supports your goal be it personal or professional.

Guest Post by William
William used to work as a web designer but he decided to deepen into programming recently. Writing platform Essay Minions was developed by him half a year ago and he is planning to emit a couple of other projects.