Ok, I was tempted to put this into the PC Coding section, however I figured it was more of a question about the program than the coding... I am a pretty avid programmer when it comes to Visual Basic... Though now, I think its time to move into a little more advanced coding, and teach myself something new.

From what I hear around with friends and people I know, C++ is a good program for programming, and really gets you to learn the ropes... Is this what your guys' opinion of the program would roughly be? Also, does anyone here know where I can either pick up a demo of C++, or even the full version? (stores, sites, etc)... Well, anything and everything is appreciated... Thanks alot...

C++ is not a program. C++ is a LANGUAGE. Other languages for example are Java, Perl, Fortran etc etc. You write your C++ code as text in a .cpp file, and then compile it so that it is executable. Then you can run your program. An example compiler would be Microsoft Visual Studio.

If you want to learn C++ I suggest you find a book from the library or look at some online tutorials. As for a compiler, I got Visual Studio .NET for free as a student at my college. It's pretty much the de facto standard compiler.

The visual studio site is http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/ . They should have information on how to purchase the compiler.

You can even use free compiler from Boroloan
http://www.borland.com/products/downloads/...d_cbuilder.html

also you can find a number free C++ compilers over here
http://www.thefreecountry.com/compilers/cpp.shtml

if you are starting off i would suggest try to get the taste of C first and then come to C++ ppl say, u dont need to know C to learn C++ but i would say get the taste of C, for sure you will enjoy learning C++.

for C you can use Kernigham&Ritchie (The C programming language) book
and for C++ you can use a book of Lipman or stroustrup

the C book is very cheap, its a must book for any C programmer. in india its only 95Rs converted to 2 US dollar

You can also go for Thinking in C++. This book generally is downloadable. gud book worth reading

gotcha... thanks alot... that will really help... I do not have much time at the moment, however i will have to check out both the links and some books and go from there... thanks for the help...

I have tried to learn about C++ from friend and suck but there is a great guide that i learnt most of my knoledge from on the main website.

ok, thanks, I appreciate that... ive got a site that has tutorials for just about everything code related, just havent had much time to put anything together as of yet...

Depends on what you're attempting to make.

Not when you're learning it doesn't. He wants to learn how to program. Its more important to learn good code structure and documentation, different programming conventions, object oriented programming (writing classes), different data structures like arrays, lists and trees and the algorithms that you use on them and the tradeoffs between using certain sctructures/algorithms etc etc.

Once you know how to program then you can worry about what you want to make and what language is better for the job.

I self-learnt C++ after doing C for a full semester. I think knowing C might help - if you're completely new to the language, then it is likely you will not be doing Object Oriented Programming for a while... and when you look at C++ minus the objects, it's very similar to C - with changes in syntax that are not difficult to get used to. Some people might find that this simply means learning the same thing over again - it's a matter of opinion, I guess.

By the way, if you're on Linux, writing the code only means that you need a good text editor (emacs and gedit offer syntax highlighting and auto indent) and compiling it is a snap, just type the command [gcc/c++ filename] from the shell. Also, you might check out topcoder.com, it is a rather nice - and popular - contest venture. If you want to test your skills, look at their sigle-round-match archive and try your hand at some of the problems. Also, their general tutorials on algorithms (quite independent of programming languages) are pretty useful.