Programming

What is Programming?

We here the word program all the time, or we here about some programming or writing a program. But what does it really mean?

First off, programming is all about finding the right algorithm to do what we need, and then implementing that algorithm. So what is an algorithm? Well, simply it is a set of instructions.

Think about your parent telling you to brush your teeth before bed. All they have to do is say "go brush your teeth", and you automatically know what you have to do. You know what set of instructions you have to follow. Somewhere in your mind you have a memory of brushing your teeth, and you access it every time you have to brush your teeth again. Really quick, what does brushing your teeth require? Let's say you are already in the bathroom. What do you have to do?

• find YOUR toothbrush
• find YOUR toothpaste
• put toothpaste on your toothbrush
• put the toothbrush against your teeth
• move the toothbrush back and forth

Now I've left out some parts, but you know how it goes. Above, there are a set of instructions which we could call an algorithm, and this algorithm can be put inside of a program.

Programming is about problem solving. "How do I get this outcome given these tools?" That is the question that all programmers ask themselves when writing a program. The tools we use are our computers, the dozens of computer languages that exist, the environments we write the computer languages in, and so many more. Programming is about being clever and changing how you think of things. You can't see your computer screen as just a screen; you have to see it as its own world, and you're changing that world when you write a program. You could even imagine yourself creating tiny little worlds inside of one giant world every time you run a program.

When you're a programmer, you're a problem solver and a translator. You have to break a problem down into tiny pieces. So with our brushing-our-teeth example, let's breakdown just one step, the first one. The first step is "find YOUR toothbrush". Some problems that might come up in your own head could be: "what does my toothbrush look like?", "what color is my toothbrush?", "where did I last put my toothbrush?", and so on. The amount of questions we could ask seem endless. As a programmer, you will gain the ability to think things through and break down a problem into its most important parts, accurately and fast.

You may be asking yourself, "how would I be a translator". Well, computers can't really understand human languages, even though some seem like they can. Computers only understand two very simple symbols(to us they would be numbers), 0 and 1. I could spend hours going on about the topic and how we translate everything into a series of 0's and 1's, but for now just know that computers only understand two things, a 0 and a 1. As a programmer, you are actually doing the first step of translation which is translating human language into a programming language, and that in itself is challenging.

Making the decision to learn how to program is just the beginning. The real fun begins when you dive right in, and just go with it. See what happens when you change that one line of code. See what happens when change that function completely. See what happens when you open up your creation to others.

Happy coding!