How does everyone stay motivated to keep programming? Personally, I''m trying to motivate myself to read a book to learn C++. While I have some experience using the language, I can''t really say that I *know* the language. But I can never make myself pick up that book. I''d always rather listen to music or play games. Anyway, has anyone else ever been in my shoes? What did you do to force yourself to pick up that book? Thanks.

It''s is something that comes naturally. If you know you want to be a programmer, you will do the neccesary reading.

It is more fun doing the actual programming, than it is to read about it. But you must start somewhere.

I''m sorry if I couldn''t give you any help.

The best way is to create something. Start out by making a tetris clone, maybe. It may seem like there''s a lot you need to know before you can do something like that, but it''s not as hard as you think.

- mallen22@concentric.net
- http://www.cfxweb.net/mxf/

I have never really picked up a book and just started reading it per se. To motivate myself and get myself away from wanting to play games, I''d see if I could make a mini-version of the game I enjoyed playing. Most times I would succeed. I''d work my way up and start making things more complex on myself so I would learn more about language features or design methodologies. That''s the way I learned at least. If I ever read a book, it''s for reference or so I learn how to do the things I want to do. Not because someone told me to read it.

Kevin

I think the best way to stay motivated while programming is to break up your work into chunks that will give you some sort of feedback after every chunk. Like first make your program display a bitmap. Then make the bitmap move. Then make the bitmap move according to keyboard input. And so on. And try to make the chunks as small as possible. One of the worst ways to stay motivated is to try to code everything at once and hope it falls together. Unless you''re going through a larval stage of course.

Staying motivated is the hardest part of anything. Actual skill level of people is sometimes an issue, but it''s always motivation that prevents people from hitting their potential.

It goes well beyond programming, or learning this task, etc... It''s more routed in the desire to ''do something'' a pretty vague description sure, but about all there is for it.

Sometimes after work, I don''t feel like working on my games, or playing music, or any of the other more productive ways I can spend my time. Sometimes that is ok, but I notice that after a few days of lack of progress, I get fidgety, and start thinking about how unproductive I''m being, and how much farther my projects would be if I put some more focus on them. I break down, and start working, and all of the sudden, I get sucked in and progress starts streaming out. Well at least that''s what it feels like, sometimes you just fix that one bug that took 2 hours to track down, but it still feels good in the end.

I agree with SiCrane''s suggestions, keep the goals small, the projects easy, and work up to harder and harder levels. I''m only working on my 3rd or 4th DirectX game project now. (Started in about October/November), I plugged away at some examples for a little bit to try and learn, and was making slow progress, but I got a lot of essentials under my belt. ( A lot being creating a DirectDraw surface ) Eventually, I said, hey, I read a guy''s article on GameDev.net saying start by creating Breakout. So guess what, I did it. It took a while, had some really funky issues, and then there was much rejoicing.

Next I took some of that code, added on to it, and made an asteroids clone. Now I''ve taken that code quite a large step forward and am making an Isometric (yes another one) engine. But I couldn''t have accomplished this a month or two ago. But now, I''m making what I think is some pretty bitchin stuff.

Who know''s, maybe you are the next Sid Meier. And all you need to do is start working on it.
So what am I saying? Only you can keep yourself motivated.

Let me tell you a story. I went to a computer camp over the summer and we would have C++ class several hours/day. Well, eventually, after programming for a while, it would be game time. While everyone ran off to get the CD''s, I stood where I was and programmed. I almost never played any of the games, I programmed. I love to do it, and I do it a lot. So the truth of the matter is, some people love to do it, others hate it. I thrive for the knowledge that the books have. In fact, I''ve been teaching myself Different programming languages since I was 7. I am now 14 and have been teaching myself C++ for about 2 years now. Some people like to do it. I''m sure that a lot of people don''t, but I sure do. If you don''t enjoy programming, then become something else. Become a game designer or artist. Programming is very important and there is always a lot of it to do. So if you don''t like to do it, you''re going to be in quite a mess. You''re obviously not going to like doing hours and hours of something you don''t like doing. So, that''s my advice. As for motivation, just imagine the final outcome of all of your hard work. Visualize your game and realize that it can be done if you try. Use your love of games as a motivation. Trust me, it helps. Good luck!

Heheh. My problem is trying to find the motivation to put the books down I have a company that, right now, is focused on selling educational aids and recruiting English teachers. We will be doing software in the near future, but it''s hard to tear myself away from the books and the compiler long enough to sell my products!

From the day I opened my first Java book (at the ripe old age of 26) I have found it very difficult to do anything else at all. I simply cannot imagine not being motivated enough to study a programming book. I''ve tried many approaches to getting away and getting some real work done, and I''ve found it all boils down to one thing: your mental state (some might say will power).

The trick is to set aside time each day to do that thing you can''t find the motivation to do. Then just do it. No ifs, ands, or buts. No excuses. Force yourself to get it done. Otherwise you put it off continually and find yourself 4 months down the road in the same place you started. You might want to set yourself a chapter a day, or an hour a day. Pick some samples from the book and add to them. Solve any problems from the exercise sections. Whatever. Just DO it

Seldom if ever do I not feel motivated to study and learn and fine tune my game programming knowledge. The only time I
feel not motivated is if I''ve had a real torching day at work. Like Aldacron I too find it hard to do my work during the day because all I think about is game programming. Being 30 years old and having a 7 month old I always find time for it because that will be my next profession. I''m already a software engineer so all I have to do is get my first game under my belt. I think that''s my true motivation is to see if I can do a tetris clone, like Geoff Howland told me. Start small and map out certain goals you want to achieve daily, weekly, or monthly and stick to them. But one thing you don''t want to do is get in the frame of mind that you will put off util tommorrow because eventually tommorrow will turn into 1month then 2 and so on so plan out your goals.

Peace,
casper

Hmmm... What works for me, is that when there''s a task that really sucks, if you just force yourself to at least start it, it becomes fun.

Admittedly starting is the hard part. After realizing that starting is the grudgingly hard part, you realize that you don''t care because when you get down to it, its actually fun. Then starting becomes easier and easier.

Thats my experience at least.

Girl: "Who are you?"
Wizard: "I''m the enchanting wizard of rhythm."
Girl: "Why did you come here?"
Wizard: "I came to spread the rhythms of the world."