How do people in other countries learn to program?

[Corrupt3d]

Hello guys,
This might seem like a silly question but I'm pretty curious about this: How do people in other (non-English speaking) countries learn to program.

Do they have to learn English, or do they have their own version of our computer languages in their native tongue (ex: French Java? Japanese C++? Spanish Python? etc). Or do they use entirely different computer languages developed by companies in those countries?

Thanks :]

[schauerlich]

Although keywords in many languages are based on English, the logic behind programming transcends human languages. It's much more about symbol manipulation/logic/manipulation of data than syntax, which is all that depends on English. Sure, it's an advantage to know english to read the code of others, because the variable and function names are more meaningful to english speakers, but it's not necessary. A lot of people do end up learning at least a little english, though. Although that probably has more to do with being on the internet a lot than anything else.

See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-English-based_programming_languages) for a list of non-english-based programming languages.

Also, in before nvteighen. :)

[diesch]

Over here in Germany chances are that you learn English (often as the first foreign language at the age of 10 or 11) before you learn a programming language.

[km0r3]

As I'm living in Paraguay, a third world country where Spanish is the first language, and I'm a Computer Science student I can tell you how you learn Programming here.
I'm going to school in a city of Paraguay of major size (30.000 + citizens), which is nothing compared to cities in other countries; Paraguay is 9x bigger than Germany and only has a population of 6.000.000+ people. My school is a "National School", which means costs are covered by the Government, which is not usual here, as you have to pay to obtain a higher education.
That's the situation:

We learned programming by writing pseudocode in Spanish, and then applied/transcribed them into a real programming language with English keywords.

We studied simple Algorithms to develop our logic.
Then we picked up QBasic as a programming language, which is just ugly, but just OK for starters as the IDE compiles to Machine language for not confusing new-comers; later we learned how to use Visual FoxPro. We have learned how to build simple programs interacting with databases, web applications and GUI programming.
In the end you learn how to build static websites with HTML and CSS.

Then we find ourselves lost in nightmare "University". :lol:

Note that we have been using only Windows. Most people in my class (school) never heard about Linux. Never. I shared a lot of my knowledge then, about Linux and Linux-based distributions, just to mention: Ubuntu. Some of them were interested in this new shiny Desktop, because it was something .. different and new and others were too conservative or scared to allow themselves to break out of their nutshells, but I could convince a lot to give it a serious try.

Though, there's a new generation of kids on its way being equipped with a Fedora-based Linux device. I recommend reading about the OLPC project (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&ved=0CAYQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Flaptop.org%2F&ei=5M2tS4i7KYKC8gbH-rDdCw&usg=AFQjCNFsxezxj0RpItuWtKe6EZXgB0Rkhg&sig2=XRPYJMywgd5No3-7t7VyWQ).
In the city I'm living almost every child which is in a grade prior to 7th has such a laptop.
It's not meant to make all of them Software Developers or IT Security Consultants, but it gives you the chance to learn Programming with the age of 3 years and up.

All in all, Computer Science (Programming is just a part of it) is at a relatively low level here in non-urbal areas compared to other countries.
Some of them, also some of my classmates, have never touched a computer before age 15. It's funny, but mostly sad to see, how they have to get familiar using a mouse, discovering a Windows Desktop (that's the most painful part) and struggling with basic text editing...; then there are also persons who know a lot more in comparison to those poor students, which parents couldn't buy their kids a computer for having no money, which unfortunately suffer because of the ignorance of those students.

The first year being in Computer Science felt like being in kindergarten, again.

At this age (17) I should be already writing my first compiler. I think. :lol:



EDIT: How you learn "Programming" in your country? :)

[nvteighen]

Also, in before nvteighen. :)

...

Ok, it's quite "irrelevant" what language the programming languages are written in. It's true that they're mostly based in English and that knowing the "etymological meaning" of some programming language's "word" will help you to retain its meaning better.

But it's irrelevant. For example, what do car and cdr mean in most Lisp dialects? "car" is the procedure that takes the first element of a pair and "cdr", which takes the second. Ok, knowing the etymology will make it easier (it's about Lisp machine registers... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAR_and_CDR), but you can learn them and use them without it.

You know, if someone coded a program in, say, C++ "in Croatian" (i.e. using Croatian names in functions and variables), I'll still be able to understand it if the C++ is well written.

That's about the linguistic issue brought up by the OP.

About other issues like funding, schools and etc. I can't say a word because I'm just an amateur. :P

[tooatw]

the syntax does not get translated, its in english

[Hellkeepa]

HELLo!

The syntax is anything but English, in fact, I'd say it's more mathematical than anything else.

Happy codin'!

[l.billon]

Although keywords in many languages are based on English, the logic behind programming transcends human languages. It's much more about symbol manipulation/logic/manipulation of data than syntax, which is all that depends on English. Sure, it's an advantage to know english to read the code of others, because the variable and function names are more meaningful to english speakers, but it's not necessary. A lot of people do end up learning at least a little english, though. Although that probably has more to do with being on the internet a lot than anything else.

See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-English-based_programming_languages) for a list of non-english-based programming languages.

Also, in before nvteighen. :)

Same here in France, we use standard programming languages, and as we have some English classes, we do not have problems understanding keywords.

Moreover, as you said it, the logic behind programming transcends human languages