Josef_Stalin

I pretty much understand c++ and the standard library. I somewhat understand the winapi. I think I'm ready to go to the next level. The question is what do I look to learn now. I hear that there are things that you must learn to be an effective programmer which are not covered in the standard library (high-level graphics). What would be the next logical step from here?

Thank you.

nnxion

It's pretty much up to you, you can go do directx, opengl, go write code for *nix, graphic applications in *nix for the X11 window system and you can do kernel level programming, edit your *nix kernel or write a completely new OS.

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"Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for."
-- Socrates

Cerulean

Whoa there, hold your horses . I severely doubt either of those, as they require high degrees of proficiency in communicating with hardware and the like... and the Linux kernel is written in C, so your C++ skills will of little use when you see a billion const char*'s.

But yeh, i'd say the next logical step is what you're interested in. Network programming, maybe? GUI programming and writing software for desktop users? Game programming? Multimedia stuff? Or a combination of all those (like myself)? Find something you're interested in, and give it a go. Have fun ;-)

Infinite Recursion

Application development! Optimization of algorithms, starting a reusable code base, playing around with graphics libraries, etc.

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http://jasonpowers.net

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root."

nnxion

Come on, const *char exist in C++ also, you can edit part of the *nix kernel you don't have to change it all.

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"Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for."
-- Socrates

BlazingWolf

This is the time to do whatever intrests you.

It's all fun(Hopefully anyway) from here on out.

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BlazingWolf

Josef_Stalin

Thanks for the suggestions. I think I have an idea what to do and that is to work on application devlopement and code organization and then I'll look work with graphics and sounds. Then I'll look at some other languages, and maybe hardware-based programming. Guess I'll be busy again. The quest to be a good programmer never ends.

clearbit

Unix is almost entirely written in C, but all things written in C can be converted to C++, or atleast thats what they claim, right?

Shapeless

thats right but the same syntax isnt everything u have to look for,...
it is one thing to edit a part but its another one to rewrite it in another language even if the one is compatible to the other ,since programming and design depends on coding paradigms ... and Object-Oriented Programming isnt the best solution for kernel coding i think. And without a doubt it aint the same as in a functional or imperative or logic programming language.

hmm thats a good thing indeed, but programming in c++ is much more than using the stl. One , i think very important "toolkit" are theboost libraries..
if u can handle them.. u can write xml/html ( or anything else) parsers or something like that. boost::spirit contains so many posibilities...
if you are well in handling the interessting parts of boost how about metaprogramming ( have a look at Andrei Alexandrescu's "Modern c++-Design") btw have u read scott meyers "effective c++" and "more effective c++" ?? all this things are important or will make u a better designing coder...
and if this all is behind ya, or you are not interested at all, than try something else like gui ( i prefer wxWidgets myself)

so far ...

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of all the things he has lost, i think he misses his mind the most

typedef typename pizza_t<oven_policy<225,12.5>,ingredient_policy<salami,mushroom,cheese> > Pizza;

Ancient Dragon

If you work with MS-Windows operating system, download the DirectX SDK (free from M$) and learn to use it. It comes with lots of example programs and short tutorials.