Hi,
I'm Lesath, twenty-one years old and a first-year cognitive science student at Carleton University. I heard about the AI challenge on Reddit and I thought I'd dive in.
At Carleton, the computer science department recently made the decision to switch its intro to programming course from teaching Java to Processing. So I won't even start learning Java until next semester. Processing is similar to Java, but a bit "dumbed down" and more oriented to producing simple graphics. I've been poking around the learning resources available to me, and I think I have a few options if I want to participate in the AI Challenge. Should I:
1. Try to learn enough Java to squeak by?
2. Try learning Python instead? (Since there are infinite Python-learning resources online, including Khan Academy etc.)
3. Or, should I submit a language request for Processing? Is Processing even powerful enough to handle what we're doing?
I'm sort of ignorant about the nature of programming languages so I'm sorry if that latter seems like a very silly question! I would appreciate some advice.