[mark-r]

Interesting the pattern in this thread - I'm 57 and started in 1973!

There's plenty of languages I've used over the years that I have no use for today, or hardly even remember: Basic, FORTRAN, assembler, Pascal. None of those languages even had exception handling, so it's hard to say that it influenced my thinking on the subject, except by forcing me to be familiar with the alternatives.

Today it's C++ and C# that pay the bills, with as much Python as I can sneak in. Next up in the queue is Javascript, for which I'm admittedly overdue, but that one's entirely on my own time.

[knice]

Just curious, as you moved from language to language do you think there were any patterns as far as the timing of your moves? Did you jump into new languages as they emerged or wait for them to reach a stable mindshare within your peers? Or perhaps waited until you needed to pick up a new language in order to pay the bills?

[mark-r]

Basic was what I started with, as did a lot of people from that era and after, just because it was simple and available. FORTRAN I tried on a lark, then got serious with it when I moved to the University mainframe. That's where I picked up the first of many assembly languages, after finding out it was the only way to take full advantage of the OS and achieve the best efficiencies. It's also where I learned Pascal, which was an up-and-coming teaching language, and it soon became my go-to language for many tasks. Between Pascal and assembly I was good through about 1990, when my job required me to use a Unix server, and of course the natural language there was C. That led to C++, first on my own time then at my next job in 1997. There was a short period where I found myself applying OO concepts to assembly code! C# was a recent addition for a job-related task where it was an obviously better choice than C++.

Python is the interesting one of the bunch. I was exposed to it about 1995, when a coworker selected it as an embedded scripting language for our product. I didn't pay much attention to it at the time, as it was outside of my immediate responsibilities. It was selected again as an embedded scripting language at my next employer around 2003. This time I paid attention, and came to love it. It's the language that lets me turn my thoughts into results the fastest.

Thanks for asking the question, I've never stopped to think about my programming history in this much detail.

[knice]

Thank you for a thoughtful, detailed response. It seems like a mix of job exposure and natural curiosity led you from language to language.

Throughout this thread, I've noted a distinct lack of dogma about everyone's evolution as a programmer. While I imagine there was some of it during the popular phase of many of these languages, it's nice to see mostly pragmatism in everyone's career journey.

[infinite8s]

I think the people who stick to dogma are the ones who don't make long multi-decade careers out of programming.