What's the benefits of learning several programming languages?

What's the benefits of learning several programming languages?
I've seen people suggesting learning C, C++, Perl, Python etc. Why wouldn't one of them be enough?

New User said:

What's the benefits of learning several programming languages?
I've seen people suggesting learning C, C++, Perl, Python etc. Why wouldn't one of them be enough?

Click to expand...

There isn't a benefit in my opinion. I guess it would be more job opportunities or something like that, but I feel it's better to pick one and just learn how to code in that one really well...

The more languages you learn the more general understanding you have, learning more and more languages gets easier the more you know.

more or less once you know one then going over to another one isn't a big deal.. only a few differences in the syntax/libraries that you use (with an exception for pointers)

it helps you fill out your resume

Learning new languages introduces you to new concepts and extends the way you think about old ones. A programmer who is only familiar with one language is like an anthropologist who is only familiar with one culture; you're cheating yourself by restricting your knowledge to one domain.

Being a Cross Platform programmer but with os specifications.

i.e:

C++ -> Windows, allows to do things that a languane such as Java which is cross platform is not able to do.

Objective C-> Mac. etc...

And thats why big programs, do not have 1 version for all os. The got one for each os.

TheDamien said:

Learning new languages introduces you to new concepts and extends the way you think about old ones. A programmer who is only familiar with one language is like an anthropologist who is only familiar with one culture; you're cheating yourself by restricting your knowledge to one domain.

Click to expand...

Agrees. And this goes deeper than learning C++, Java and C#. You should learns languages from every paradigm, if not you're most likely missing out on many ways to make both your programming and your programs better.
If you're one of those people who only programs to get a job (wtf is wrong with you?) then the biggest benefit is safety. You wont be able to use the same language during your whole carrier, perhaps you wont even be able to use the same language during your first 10 years. Getting into the habit of learning at least one language per year will make it easier to switch when job opportunities for your language of choice starts to drop. Also, if you don't think it's fun to learn languages then you're probably doing the wrong thing in your life...

>And thats why big programs, do not have 1 version for all os. The got one for each os.
That's not really true. The installer and compiled formats might differ, but the source code is pretty much the same, save some conditional compilation in lower level libraries. Only platforms that forces you to develop in a specific language suffers from the "one code base per platform" problem.

Different companies use different languages. so assuming you want to work at a gaming company, you are more likely to know the language they use.

But its not limited to that, for example, visual basic is somewhat usable in Microsoft excel macros, proving that sometimes its also about using the language for other applications.

Or maybe you want to do one thing, but its impossible or inefficient due to the lack of a certain feature in one language, therefor you'd use another one that handles that feature better

You could find more jobs!

Because it's easy when you know one and no one programming language can do everything.

Also Ruby is amazing.

about the jobs and it being easy - there are usually "standards" or conventions that you should follow for each language, for example in c++ global constants are to be written in ALL_CAPS, in java classes start with an upper case letter, etc. etc. and those change from language to language, which might make it harder to remember which one to use when

My old teacher used to say this:
I am not teaching you c++ in this class, I am teaching you to write programs.

I have noticed that it is somewhat true what the others have stated above, if you learn how to code then it won't be that much of a problem to code in other languages. There is always a transition period though, but the more you learn the shorter that period gets