Thread: Most Useful Linux Related Programming Language(s)

I want to learn a new programming language, just for something to do. I'm building a Linux rig pretty quick here, so what's a good language to learn? I want something that's not brutally complicated, but is still useful. Thanks

It kind a depends on what you already know, and if you want to stick to open source tools...

C & C++ are the main programming languages, and always useful.
Perl & Python (scripting) are always useful.
Java has been around for a long time and just keeps gong.
PHP (5 or 6) is well worth knowing, if you know C++ you'll find it big-time easy to learn PHP; learning MySQL will compliment it very well; PHP 6 will probably be a much sought after skill in a year or two.

C# (& Mono) I'm in two minds about, there's a lot of need for C# programmers; but MS holds all the patents and could let loose the Dogs of Law at any moment...

I'd say that C++, Perl, and even Java fit the description "brutally complicated" (for beginners at any rate). I'd go with C or PHP. But it's kinda difficult to be sure without knowing what languages you already program in. C will provide a good foundation for many other languages; on the other hand it's much easier to do useful things like database access with PHP.