Ask HN: I just want to have fun programming again
This thread has a lot of language suggestions, but I think you need a fun problem to solve. Pick a toy app and work on it. Learn embedded programming with an Arduino. Write an iPhone app to track when you feed the dog. Make a karaoke app for Android. If you pick a project you'll enjoy, the language won't matter. Use whatever is best for the platform. The fun doesn't come with the language, it comes with seeing your project come to life, or others' reaction to the cool thing you made. Every language sucks and every language is the best depending on who you ask. Don't focus so deeply on that part. Solve cool and fun problems.<p>I've had a long time dream of getting a broken jukebox and gutting it for a Raspberry Pi, but keeping the external interface in tact. I know next to nothing about hardware engineering, and can't write more than ten lines of Python without needing to Google something, but I finally got a broken juke in need of fixing, a multimeter, and a hard drive full of music ready to go. The fun isn't the Python or learning GPIO, it's that eventually I will have a cool retro jukebox with hardware and software I wrote in my basement.