Is there a kind of program you'd like to be able to write?
By analogy, first you say you want to get into transportation, and someone says "OK, here's how to learn how to fly a plane, ride a bicycle, drive a car, pilot a submarine..." and you say, "oh, I'd really just like to learn to sail", and that narrows it down to something where it's easy to say, "oh, OK, here's where to go to learn to sail".
So if you think of a kind of program that would be useful to you, we can better suggest how to get started with the basics of doing that :-)
A program that counts words, periods, commas, sentences? That would be nice for my writing, or at least interesting. I've always wonder how many periods I've used....
Sorry, but that's really all I can think of. I'm not even certain I know what is and isn't a program.
I've only gotten about a quarter through this, but I like what I've heard. Is there a place where I can experiment, aside from the one already mentioned?
I generally take the scheme folder and put it inside the arc folder. This is not required, but earlier I found it easier to manage as they become one movable install.
Arc is best suited to unix/linux or mac operating systems. Arc has some issues on Windows, but In the past I still managed to get it working on windows.
If you're using a unix/linux or mac os you need to find the Terminal application that is already there and launch it.
In the terminal window you need to navigate to the arc directory. You can do this by typing 'cd' (change directory)
followed by the path to the arc folder...
In my case:
Terminal $ cd /users/thaddeus/arc
If all goes well, as a test, you should be able to type 'ls' which will show you the files existing in the arc directory.
Terminal $ ls
now to you can invoke arc by typing (note change the paths to respect your install directories):
Windows is similar only you're using the 'cmd' utility rather than the terminal.
You can start 'cmd' (command prompt) by going to your operating systems 'Start' button then select 'Run' and type 'cmd' into the text entry box (& hit 'ok'). A dialog window should come up. Here you also need to navigate to the arc directory:
Mine starts like this:
C:\Documents and Settings\thaddeus>_
So I change the path to the arc directory like so (note change the paths to respect your install directories):
C:\Documents and Settings\thaddeus> cd C:\thaddeus\arc
I typed all this up on my lunch hour at work, so I didn't actually do the steps - just memory recall. So if you hit a snag ask, I may have typed something wrong.
That's why I pointed you down to the appendix. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step --- but so does a journey down the street to the chemists.
Face that you need to dive in. Have you picked up a book yet? No more questions until you take the first step. Read the introduction and chapter one. Follow the instructions on how to install the language. Do the exercises. A carefully written and revised book will be a far better first step than an argumentative grab-bag of Arc hackers.
Then start asking questions --- because you'll have interesting ones.
