Advice Please - Best Language to Learn for GIS

[Eman Ramos]

Hello, experts!

I'm studying Geographic Information Systems (primarily using ArcInfo) and am required to take a programming course.

The choices at my junior college ar Visual Basic, Java and C/C++.

I am utterly ignorant about all of these. (I noticed that ArcInfo uses Python for scripts, but it's not offered at my school.)

Can anyone offer some insight as to which of these options would be a) easiest for a novice to learn, and/or b) most useful for GIS applications?

Thanks for any help.
Cheers,
E.Ramos

[Rashakil Fol]

Of those three, I'd guess you'd have the best time with Java. If not that, then C++. But get around to learning Python anyway, because isn't learning a programming language fun in itself? ;-)

I don't really know anything about Geographic Information Systems, but I am guessing that right now you don't need to learn lower level details that C++ has. (And there's a more of a risk that the C++ course will be taught really badly.) If you learn VB, learn it as a later language, not your first.