Can you learn to program on your own?

Every once in a while a profession becomes fashionable that, if you study it, will be your passport to fame or fortune or, a skill that if your children do not learn it will condemn them to failure. At present it is the creation of applications and, before it is replaced by Artificial Intelligence, we will try to answer the question: Can you learn to program self-taught?

Let's be clear, there is absolutely no discipline that will guarantee success and, while it is true that a good programmer acquires skills that will be useful in life, they can also be acquired by studying other things.

I remember from my teenage years in the eighties, an advertisement that said that if you learned Basic, companies would fight to hire you. Basic is a general-purpose language that is hardly good for building applications that are used in the real world. Years later, the teaching of computer science in schools was included, which was nothing more than explaining the use of Microsoft office tools. In recent years they popularized programming courses which should actually be called coding courses because they are only limited to teaching the rudiments of a programming language.

Can you learn to program on your own?

The discussion about whether to study at a university to pursue a career as a programmer reappears from time to time on social networks. Of course, those who took it are fervent supporters of the diploma, while those who trained themselves deny that need. In general, companies in the sector seem to prefer the demonstration of skills over the scrolls.

In any case, you don't just learn to program to earn money. It can also be done to collaborate on open source projects or to create applications that suit our needs.

Regarding the question in the title, it is true that you can, but keep in mind that the more you practice, the better programmer you will be.

What should a programmer learn?

Probably any applied primary school student knows about Spanish grammar the same as Pérez Reverte or Vargas Llosa. However, he will not be able to write a good novel. The same goes for programming. You can memorize all the commands of a language and memorize thousands of lines of code, and yet that doesn't make you a programmer.

The first skill required for a programmer is objectivity and logical reasoning ability. An application must solve problems, and the developer must identify what it is, imagine a solution, and be able to implement it before writing code.

The next step is to identify which programming language is the most suitable to build the application. In the sector there is a lot that if you only have a hammer you will believe that all problems are nails.

For each programming language there are several integrated development environments. Many are compatible with several programming languages, so becoming familiar with one of them will save a lot of work.

Most Linux distributions include support for the most popular programming languages ​​as well as a selection of integrated development environments.

Some recommended distributions to learn programming

This it is an absolutely personal selection. In principle any Linux distribution can be used for programming.

• Ubuntu: It is a distribution very popular so if you are looking for how to do something on linux you will probably find how to do it on ubuntu. In addition, it has the most complete selection of programs and different forms of installation.
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux: If you are a developer, you can get a free license and access very useful tools for programmers such as container management and support for different programming languages.
• fedora:  It is a distribution A community forum testing features that will later be part of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. In its repositories you can find the most current versions of the programming tools.