Hi Clive, I am afraid I might upset things by saying 'If he has Mindstorm then stay with that'. The first things you need to learn (control flow, data ffow and decision making) are all in it with the added bonus that all the control structures are automatically closed correctly. This last sentence might not make much sense to you but it doesn't need to with Mindstorm, but an understanding will be needed with any text-based language.
In addition any 'normal' language will also mean that he needs to learn about variables and to use the correct syntax before he can write anything. Any other language will give a much steeper learning curve with many more traps to fall into. Mindstorm makes a great paddling pool before he attempts the swimming pool of Python etc. Once he has mastered Mindstorm then move onto Python, until then there is no point. Having said all this I must admit that I have had little experience of Mindstorm, but I have been using LabVIEW, of which Mindstorm is a cut down version, professionally for five years. I have also great experience with several 'normal' languages. Has he tried the Mindstorm NXT forums (eg http://messageboards.lego.com/en-US/showforum.aspx?ForumID=1421 ) when he gets stuck? Kevin Giles -- Next meeting: 2012-10-?? 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:[email protected] How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
