when did you become computer literate?

[supa dupa ninja]

I learned what a computers was, and does when I was in 1st grade.
I learned how to use one last year when I was a freshman.
I'm a slow bloomer with all things that are related to technology (except techno music). so...

when did you guys learn how to use a computer?

[Link Antilles]

When, I was six a knew the basics of computers. In sixth grade, I started learning Visual Basic and QBasic. Eight grade, I learned some HTML and made my first website "Advance Gaming 101" which was a fair Video game review site, it's dead now. Freshman year, I made my first computer game "Lawn Mage". Sophomore year, I built my first two computers "Gnome" and Glichty". This year, I'm learning Java. O'yeah, I can only type under 30 word per minute. lol

[Mr. Rogers]

i first started learning about computers when i got my first one, like 5 or 6 years ago, maybe 7. it was an only mac performa 6200cd i think. it was top of the line back then, a blazing fast 75mhz processor and 8 megs of RAM!!!! and dont forget the 14.4 modem. hehe. over the years i just kept messing with them and reading lots about them and about the new computer stuff coming out, and just learned tons about them like that. i wanna build one soon,but i need a ........ *scary music and thunder and lightening* job first . the one im using now is so slow, its only a 350mhz k6-2, and im running XP pro on it

[LorentzForce]

learnt to type on computers at age of 8. learnt to start programming the next year on GWBASIC.

i love God for allowing me to learn computers this fast.

[Bobtheduck]

I got a toy computer when I was like 8, and also started learning to program basic... Then I think when I was about 10 I got my apple II. I actually made a cheesy little game that was a treasure hunt... You moved the face around the screen and pressed a button when you wanted him to check for treasure... When you won, it would play a little diddy... When I was 13 I got a new computer, a 486 66 Mhz with CD ROM (and this one ALSO had 8 megs of ram)!!! And that ran windows 3.1 for workgroups. It never crashed... well, almost... I had to adjust my programming skills because I didn't know how to program in the windows basic, so I eventually made a text game I called "V-rock" and it had battles and such... I tried to make it like "Adventure" sort of... My computer never crashed until I installed two certain programs: Civilization 2 and Klik n Play... Those were both installed on a cheesy 500 k hard drive... Then I got windows installed, and I knew I needed more HD space, so when I got my cyrix 166 MHZ (well, 133 but they say it ran the same as an intel Pentiem 166... A cursed lie, I say...) and 32 megs of ram and a 7 GB HD.

Programs I grew up on:

Applesoft Basic
Microsoft Qbasic
Sound Recorder (I had so much fun when I discovered my computer's mic jack... So much fun)
Mavis beacon
Microsoft Paintbrush
Klik n Play

I learned to type at a college course when I was like 10, I think... (ok, so this is out of order) about the same time as I got my computer.

I stopped programming alltogether and just started using klik n play until I lost it... That was a sad day... So i didn't make any more games after my last klik n play game... I almost gave up on making games.

I don't remember when I discovered the internet, but it was definately a bittersweet thing... -_- I got a 19.9 something modem and AOL version 3.0. My curiosity and explorative nature then caused me some major problems (one of them being me getting kicked off AOL permanently...) It all started with an issue of Boot Magazine and went downhill from there...

The internet, however, is really how I learned about anime. That and the "Sci-fi" channel. I mean, if I had never gotten that issue of boot and started to do some bad things, I never would have found out about sailormoon and never would have gotten interested in anime and never would have then in turn formed an interest in Japan, I wouldn't be learning Japanese now and I probably wouldn't be learning 3d animation... But, I really wish there were another way I could have arrived at this point... It's sad that it had to be through something that could have distroyed my life...

I became more "computer art literate" later on... I only just took my first computer animation course in January of this year. And in one semester, got to this point

So yeah... I have been computer literate for a long time, it's just in the last couple years I'd lost contact and kinda fell behind... That'll change.

[Heaven's Cloud]

About 3 or 4 years ago when I was around the age of 7 and 6. I could use the internet, infact I used a vBulletin message board at the age of 8. Though I am still learning HTML, and Programming, I still don't think I'll complete that until a year or so.

[Straylight]

I started when I was 7 years old, on a Sinclair QL. You huad to program it in order top get the most out of it

[Heaven's Cloud]

So, what should I do if I want to learn like programming, C++, HTML, or Java?

[Straylight]

I'd recommend buying a book in the chosen language, I've always found that I learn faster that way

[Heaven's Cloud]

Okay, what should I start out with, or any recommendations for any books?

[Straylight]

If you wanna learn to program, they say that Java is quite good. However I personally think that C++ would be more useful. HTML isn't a programming language but these days is an incredibly useful thing to know. I started learning it about 5 years ago and now rarely need to look at reference manuals.

The reason they recommend java is that it's a good language conceptually.

As far as books go, I'd recommend anything by O'Reilly as they produce consistantly good titles that are easy to follow

[Mithrandir]

As far as books go, I'd recommend anything by O'Reilly as they produce consistantly good titles that are easy to follow

Word. (OK, I may have used that 'word' inappropriately, but you'll have to forgive me. I'm old. ) OR&A are the bibles of programming (in some cases literally). Depending on what you want to do, I'd pick an appropriate language. If you wanna do database/web stuff I'd learn either perl or PHP. Since it's so much like C, I'd say perl; if you wanna ever do any admin work - go with perl. Can you tell I'm biased? If you wanna write applets, go with java.

I started programming on an Apple II (I won't tell you when, but it wasn't ancient when I started.) I was a blazing fast 1mhz 6502 (shooby will be proud) that shipped with, count 'em: 4 KB of ram. That was a LOT just then. I think it could take up to, like 64 KB (with rom), but it's been a LONG time... It had applesoft basic hard coded on the rom. I miss that computer.

Anyway, I mostly learned how to write/hack games for it (as good a game as could be written, using only basic - think ultima II; no I didn't write it, I hacked it).

When I got to college (CS major), I realised how little I knew about computers. Now I keep learning new things constantly, and firmly believe that I know next to nothing about computers. In the grand sceme of things, I'd say I'm not all that litterate. If I were to compair myself to others, though, I'd say it was when I started programming. Eep.

I'd keep going but I'm bored (and I'm sure you are too).

[shooraijin]

My first was a Tomy Tutor (2.7MHz TMS 9995), and then the Commodore 64 (1.0225MHz 6510). I was seven when we got the Tutor, and I haven't looked back since.

My first Mac was a IIsi.

[Technomancer]

I started learning when my family got its first computer, a TI99/4A. I only really got into programming in Grade 3 or 4, where I started learning TI Extended BASIC, and LOGO. Mostly I was interested in text/graphical adventures.

Later, in high school I picked up Turing (which is what was taught), Pascal, C and Assembler (x86 and Z80). In my undergraduate career I also did more programming, and more importantly picked up a lot of stuff on digital electronics and computer architecture. Obviously all of my own work is computer based these days (mostly in MATLAB).

[Heaven's Cloud]

Technomancer, I am about the age where you learned to program with basic stuff. The question has obviously been asked by me earlier, but what good begining programming downloads, or languages do you suggest for me to learn. Or do you happen to know any sites.

[MyrrhLynn]

BAH! This thread makes me feel old!! The first computer I ever consistently used was in 4th grade we had some apples in our classroom. They had the green and black screens and took the original floppys. (You know the ones that went "weeh, weeh" when you shook them?!?)

I started on the Internet in... 7th grade (I think) that was back though when magazines like Time had articles about "The Death of the Internet" so yeah it was a very new thing back then.

[Technomancer]

Don't worry about feeling old, our old TI had a cassette drive! As for programming, I'd recommend learning a language that enforces good programming habits early (although it should be somewhat useful as well). Of course it also depends on what you want to do.

QBASIC, if you stay away from goto statements is pretty good, and fairly easy to pick up. It also supports procedural programming, and just becuase it's called BASIC, doesn't mean you can't do some sophisticated things.

I think I'd probably recommend PASCAL though. With the exception of its Delphi variant it's not really used in industry unfortunately. However, I think it remains one of the better introductory languages that is available, since it is quite powerful in alot of ways but also requires a disciplined approach and the code is very easy to read. C is more widely used, and is more flexible (which can be its danger), but the syntax can sometimes be trickier. In any event once you know one programming language (esp. the Algol derivatives like Basic, Pascal, and C), the others are very easy to pick up. It's those first concepts that matter the most I think.

Wrt downloads, hhmm. I don't really know since I learned mostly from books. However, if you're interested in "gee-whiz" graphics effects you might try some of Denthor's tutorials, which are avaialble from Programmer's Heaven. You should probably find plenty of other tutorials there as well.

[Rashiir]

I had an Apple II+ in my room when I was like 4. I learned a little about Basic, and played games and stuff. (Hooray for the animal game!) When I was like 8 or 10 we got a Performa 637 and I used to get up every morning before school at 4:00 and use it for like 3 hours. This was when I really learned to use the computer. I learned HTML not too long later. I just recently learned how to use linux/unix.

[ShiroiHikari]

We used to go to the computer lab when I was in kindergarten, to do math and stuff. So, it was computers at school that did it for me, I think they were IBMs. And -eventually- we got one at home, I think it was an IBM of some kind too. It was hellish trying to get it to boot up though It ran Windows 3.1. I was pretty good at navigating it and stuff, but to this day I don't know programming and my HTML skills are questionable o_O

[andyroo]

When? At birth. But seriously, I guess whenever. I remember having a Packard Bell 3200 running MS-DOS when I was little. I learned a little bit from some computer flash cards that I have no idea where they came from. Then came the .com boom. A few before then my folks got a more "modern" computer: a Gateway 2000 running the revolutionary os Windows 95 and I use it to this day using Win98 instead. I have in recent years learned Python and am learning BASIC. I'm pretty compitent in HTML. Oh yeah, I'm also reading up on "Humane Interface Design".

[Mithrandir]

I think I'd probably recommend PASCAL though.

I'll back this one up. With the exception of the capitalization of the language name. (IT'S NOT AN ACRONYM!!) Pascal is a good first run language. While it's true that it isn't used that heavily in industry, there are good reasons to start off with it. Let me explain this way. It's easy to learn, unlike some of the more widely used languages in industry. It's important to remember that the vast majority of people who try to learn C on their own time (not because it's needed at work or school) decide to quit after a week. There's too much to it, and it takes a LOT of work to do anything. If you have access to a linux box, though, you probably have gcc (the gnu C compiler) installed. For any other variant of C, (read: one that does cool graphics) you'll most likely need to purchase the language package. Those get expensive real quick. I still think perl is a good language to learn on. It's easy to use, has a wide support base (http://www.cpan.org), you don't have to compile it, it works on almost all platforms and it's free. The downside is that the language is not 'well defined' or as Technomancer put it, "It doesn't force you to learn good habits early." If you are thinking about going into programming as a profession, you will need these habits. However, if you don't know if you want to do that for a living, you may want to try a scripting language to see if you like it. Unlike compiled languages, scripting languages are 'interpreted' not 'executed.' This means that the end program is (usually) slower and that it needs an interpreter to run. On the other hand, it's (usually) easier to write a program in a scripting language. For example, in perl I can say:
[code]
#!/usr/bin/perl -w #Point the script to the perl interpreter (w = warn)
print "Hello, world!"]

Then I can just execute it. I don't have to compile it. It's a bit more tricky to do this in C (or C++).

Anyway, that's my bias.

[Jericho]

When I was 15 and I started using AOL. Then I gained more knowledge after purchasing my own computer, and then later after the military sent me to training to work on computers.

Now I'm trying to go to school for Information Technology or Computer Science, whichever is quicker so I can get out of the military and get a better paying job.

[shooraijin]

I'm a fan of scriptable and interpreter-based languages too -- I developed (on the C64) a habit of writing code incrementally where I could write some code, run it, write some more, run it, tweak what I wrote, run it, write some more, run it ... compilers take all the fun out of that kind of development cycle.

Perl lets me engage in those habits all over again. A periodic threat of mine is to port Perl to the Commodore 64. I don't think Larry believes me when I say I'm serious.

[Mithrandir]

I don't know, man. That interpreter is over a MEG. Where are you gonna PUT it?

[shooraijin]

I'm not going to port the interpreter, silly. I'm going to port Parrot. (Remember, Perl 6 is going to be based on Parrotcode.) The problem is just getting the PMC stubs over -- the actual assembly language itself isn't too tricky.

[Technomancer]

I'm a fan of scriptable and interpreter-based languages too -- I developed (on the C64) a habit of writing code incrementally where I could write some code, run it, write some more, run it, tweak what I wrote, run it, write some more, run it ... compilers take all the fun out of that kind of development cycle.

You should still be able to do that if you're using an IDE (eg. TurboPascal/C++, etc).