Thread: Which program?

To answer that question I would need to know what you found difficult. For the most part, except for taking advantages of language features, the logic (or call it the thought process) of writing a program is pretty much the same. So if you had a difficult time figuring out how to accomplish the task, the language wont change that all that much. C and C++ both use pointers and can pass addresses of primitives and objects (and even functions - aka methods). Java uses what are call references (which are similar but not as versatile). If it was the syntax that was confusing I would say that Java might be easier in that regard but that is my opinion. All languages have their good and bad sides. Many introductory courses are now using Python which I am now teaching myself. It has its own uniqueness but I am finding it pretty easy (but I am also a computer scientist, and have programmed in Perl which is similar).

And sometimes the difficulties can be the instructor. Some can teach better than others. So again, it is hard for me to make a recommendation. You may want to ask some of your peers who are in the same situation as you and see what they have taken.

Some IDE's are complicated and support many things unrelated to programming or support a variety of languages which can also be confusing. I use Eclipse and like it. JGrasp is one that others have used which is pretty simple but from my experience it doesn't support real-time syntax analysis so you need to wade thru the error messages to make corrections.

NOTE: I just read your intro. You said above that you didn't want to be a programmer but in your intro you wanted to teach computer programming. Imho, do to that you will need to take more than a programming course. What if the college wants you to teach Java or C++ or Python? Many teachers teach languages they are unfamiliar with but have the ability to learn them quickly to satisfy intro programming courses because that is their field of study. So you need to consider that.

Good luck!

Regards,
Jim

You may want to try some of the online resources. Here are some I recommend:

For Python, check out tutorial and library reference here
https://docs.python.org/3/index.html

For Java, check out tutorial and Java API in the following links
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/index.html (up to Java 8 only)
https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/api/index.html (java 8 - java 9,10, and 11 have been release but Java 8 has essentials for learning).

You can also learn and practice coding at codecademy.com

Regards,
Jim