Beginner question: finding a site with problems that a novice Java programmer can work with

Question

Welcome all. I am new to the wonderful world of programming and just stumbled upon this site here. I am very happy to get into programming in general, as I have met a ton of other impatient people in the business that I am interning this summer. This is a great community and I am very happy to be part of this community!

I'm going to my Sophomore year at a college in computer science. Last semester, I took a beginner course in Java programming. I really like this language, but my teacher didn’t explain the language very well, and I (and the rest of the class) are behind.

In the business I interned with this summer, I found that they have a corporate subscription to Safari Books. I spilled through the site looking at various tutorials when I came across Head First Java. I read it almost every day, and I slowly sorting through my tongue again.

I would like to test my knowledge and skills by completing novice projects or problems, for example those that you will find at the end of the tutorial. The First chapter provides many examples of completion code related to the project described in detail in the chapters, however I want to make some other projects in which I have no link; where I can fully apply myself without additional help.

I did a quick Google search and I can’t find any websites or web pages that have a list of beginner programming problems. Does anyone here have a list that they know, or a page that they have posted, or even ideas for some problems that I can solve!

Thank you very much in advance, and I look forward to learning and further application!

Answer 1

Simple tasks for a beginner Java (or Python):

http://codingbat.com/

Or for more mathematical problems:

http://projecteuler.net/

If you need more complex minor issues, I recommend http://uva.onlinejudge.org/ .

Answer 2

When I started, I had a lot of fun playing with some small games (text-advantages, minesweeper, tic-tac-toe ...). It's fun, and you can start with simple solutions, no matter what comes to mind.

If you feel a little more confident, you need to think about which direction you want to go with small applications. You want to create a multi-user version, perfectly implement the client-server interaction, perhaps write a small chat program. Algorithms and artificial intelligence, try to let the computer solve your games.

In general, I have to say that work on small projects over the course of several days or weeks was constantly improving , they were more motivating for me than just implementing tons of tiny few -liners.

Answer 3

Stackoverflow has a tag called code-golf, which basically is a difficult task to write the smallest application (in any language) that meets the requirements. If you are studying, you may not receive the main voice response, but many of them are simple problems that you must work with. In addition, there should be other examples in the responses to help.

fooobar.com/questions/tagged / ...

Answer 4

I used this book (or earlier editions) to teach a couple of people java / write actual code in java. The problems in the book are pretty well thought out, and it's good for getting used to performing real tasks. I contacted amazon for details, but you can get the book at many college / university libraries (find your worldcat to see if your library has one or near it)

Good luck

Answer 5

As mentioned, CodingBat has some practice problems, and you can also try some interviews. See also my Learneroo website, which has many practice problems. It would be nice to just build a project yourself and get help from someone when you need it. You can make a simple project, such as a text editor or a simple game, and try to give it your own unique twist. Here are some more project ideas:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/106510/what-is-a-good-application-programming-problem-to-solve-for-beginners

https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/756/where-can-i-find-programming-puzzles-and-challenges