Start with some C++ framework or python [closed]

Question

I am thinking about to learn new language or framework. Now I deal with C# and WPF, WCF, Winforms. I have some free time so I would like get new skills.

But I have dilema, start with some C++ framework (such as Platinum, Reason, Evocosm, ACF) or try Python / python framework.

I you are on my place which possibility you choose?

I am 17 years student, I have basic skills in C++ (OOP, little with STL), with Python I haven’t any experience.

What would be your choice and why?

Answer 1

Python is incredibly easy to learn, very powerful, and very useful (especially for web development IMO).

C++ is very widespread and is similar to other languages like C# and Java. Python's syntax is quite unique and AFAIK is not very similar to any other languages. Nonetheless, Python syntax is far easier to read and cleaner to write than C++. Python is also fairly widespread and is used by huge companies like Google.

C++ has some wonderful libraries that can really help development, like Boost and Qt. Python also has excellent libraries like Django (for web development) and Twisted (for networking stuff). I find that C++ libraries tend to be broader in scope than Python libraries do, but the Python standard library is far better than the STL, IMO.

Python recently had a backwards-incompatible release (Python 3), and most libraries haven't caught up yet, so you might have to use Python 2 to take advantage of some of Python's libraries.

C++ is a lot faster than Python in terms of execution speed, but Python more than makes up for it in terms of development speed. Plus, Python allows you to write performance-critical parts of your application in C or C++.

Overall, I'd say go with Python, mostly because it's easy to learn and use, and makes programming simple and fun.

Answer 2

I recommend you to keep learning C++. Before you started looking for framework learn some popular search algorithm and try implement them. After that try implement some structures, like queues, list, stack, binary trees and some operation on them. Meanwhile play with I/O (for example, try write your stack to file and read it back to stack - in plain text and binary).

It was my university tour on programming class. C++ is good choice because it is hard and multiparadigmats language so in future u will find much in common with other languages and you will be familiar with memory management system.