that's toptastic, folks, thanks for all that!
i know you were joking voidmain, but is it really the case that a lot of ongoing systems still use those old languages?
i do have linux, and i do know a tiny bit of html. i find what i do know to be quite straightforward so i will continue to nose into it as i go. as i say i downloaded 2 books about c++, a document by B.Kernighan about C (written in 1975, so lots of comparisons to Fortran in it!) which i am reading now. I also have a couple of java books, one i downloaded and one i actually have the book of, so i'll get into them once i have read the C books.
Also, i'll try all the stuff you guys mentioned. i reckon i will be kept going for a lo o o o o ng time.
Re: assembly language, that's the one where you enter data purely as hex numbers isn't it? (they called it machine code when i was at school) i did an introductory course in machine code, as the technological studies course i was doing reckoned it was essential to have a knowledge of what was going on with binary and machine code. I thought it was very straightforward and i liked it, but i do reckon that a lot of its limitations could be addressed, obviously that is what programming languages are for.
I'll throw myself into it then, when i can, and see what i come up with. thanks a lot for all yr input, folks.......
