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List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: [Possibly slightly OT] KDE development
From:       Richard Stevens <mail () richardstevens ! de>
Date:       2001-06-18 16:41:27
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On Monday 18 June 2001 17:23, Chris Howells wrote:
> I'm sorry if this is slightly off topic, but I'm not aware of a more
> relevant place for advice.
>
> I'd really like to start doing work on KDE development.
>
> However, do I *need* to learn C++ first, and then start learning Qt and
> KDE?
>
> Or can I just work through David Sweet's KDE 2 Development, without
> working my way through a C++ first?
>
> I'm not interested in writing console applications etc. (at this stage),
> just working on KDE.
>
> I'm a student, and would be doing it in my spare time, which (like most
> people), sadly I don't have much of. :(

Hiho,

did you program before? Anything object oriented? Maybe JAVA? If you would 
say you are a quick (programming language) learner or even have some 
experience in programming "real" languages before. Don't want to start a war 
here but I mean something like C/C++/JAVA and not e.g. Basic. I'd recommend 
you "C++ how to program" by Deitel & Deitel. It covers quite a bit of C++ 
(Basic language features, Control Structures, Data Types, Classes, Operator 
Overloading) as well as OO Topics (Inheritance, Polimorphism) and also quite 
a bit of the standard classes and constructs (Streams, templates, Exceptions, 
Files). Additionally some chapters deal with topics a little "closer to the 
machine" and also STL (Standard Template Library) is covered. 

I think the book is good for people that are willing to put some effort in 
learning the language. It is also advanced enough to not let you down after 
some weeks/months of C++ programming. It has quite a bit of example code that 
is very well commented and used to explain what was mentioned in the theory 
block. 

I think you won't have a lot of fun and success trying to learn C++ 
programming and KDE Development just with David Sweet's book. Then again If 
you get the hang of C++ a bit, you can start with the KDE Stuff as exercises. 

The biggest problem is though to learn and get to know the classes. KDE comes 
with a huge and very powerful classlibrary that hides most of the nasty 
details of you and most of the time, the biggest problem is to figure out 
which class does the job.

In short, I think those two books can get you there. I'm myself learning C++ 
and the KDE stuff from from those two books and I think it works ok 
considering the small amount of time I have for it.

Hope that helped a bit,

cheers,

Richard

- -- 
- ---
http://www.richardstevens.de

Unix IS user friendly, it is just selective about who his friends are.
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