Newbie car enthusiast on a permit... Hello!

[comingbackdown]

Hello hello.
New to the forums, and kind of new to driving a standard shift car.
I was bad at it at first. I'm improving. Lately I've been begging my dad to install a tach on my car. No more using the little shift light. So, we're going to install one... It's about time... I don't get why they wouldn't put a tach on a standard shift car...

I'm on a permit... May God help those who are on the road with me. (just kidding. I'm a better driver than most kids my age... I realize that, if I

My car is a 1994 Chevrolet Cavalier 4-Cylinder. It's blue. It's not exactly
a big mean speed machine, but it's a car, and it runs. That's all I need at the moment. My dream car is an '06 Pontiac GTO, standard shift of course. I've been in one. That thing is damn fast... I was impressed. In my opinion, you know you're driving a powerful car when you shift and it knocks you back into the seat like being hit with an i-beam.

I'm a musician, a student, a computer programmer (I'm new to it), a web designer, and a bit of a car maniac. I love standard shift. I'm not great at it yet, but I love it. When you're driving a stick, it feels like you're really driving. There's a man to machine connection there. I feel more in control of the car. (my mother doesn't get it. I feel sorry for her...)

I'm working my way to opening a home based web-design and application development business. I'm a ways away from the app-dev part of the business, but I can build a basic website quite well. Currently learning scripting. I'd say about a month or two, I can move on to PHP Script. After that, Coldfusion and ASP.NET. But, enough boring you with computer jargon. Tomorrow, I drive! YEEEEEEEEEEEHAH!

Yet another newbie on a permit...

[Slicky]

Welcome. I also have a Cavy, albiet not a stick but I didn't have a tach either, and I just like having gauges in my car to see if its running well. I have a '98, so its a different body style than yours, but I ran into a problem when installing the tach I put in. My car has a DIS (Distributorless Ignition System), and no tach wire lead to tap into that I could find, not about to dig down into the ecu parts of the car. But I did find this http://www.cardomain.com/item/ATM9117 Which enabled me to use one, and hookup was very simple. Price is a bit steep, you might be able to track down a cheaper one...I dont believe I paid 70 for it when I got it...they might have jacked up the price

Anyway, dont go off and get it right away if you dont need it. Just throwing it out there for ya if you get stuck in the process as it might help out. Good luck though!

[comingbackdown]

Welcome. I also have a Cavy, albiet not a stick but I didn't have a tach either, and I just like having gauges in my car to see if its running well. I have a '98, so its a different body style than yours, but I ran into a problem when installing the tach I put in. My car has a DIS (Distributorless Ignition System), and no tach wire lead to tap into that I could find, not about to dig down into the ecu parts of the car. But I did find this http://www.cardomain.com/item/ATM9117 Which enabled me to use one, and hookup was very simple. Price is a bit steep, you might be able to track down a cheaper one...I dont believe I paid 70 for it when I got it...they might have jacked up the price

Anyway, dont go off and get it right away if you dont need it. Just throwing it out there for ya if you get stuck in the process as it might help out. Good luck though!

Luckily for me, my dad has been working on cars and tractors since the 1970s. He's currently working at Autozone, so he could get an affordable one with an employee discount (although that discount isn't much, but it's better than paying full price). The fun part will be installing it, but... I really want one. It'll help me to learn. My dad needs to learn to rev-match too... He doesn't even know the meaning of the term...

I don't want to drive a vehicle without a tach... I don't know if my car has a rev limiter, so... If I mess up and pass the redline, I'm screwed... I can't see the redline, so it's technically more likely to happen if I'm not careful. So, I'd rather have the security of a tach. Wow... i'm rather opinionated for a noob, am I not?

[Slicky]

Wow... i'm rather opinionated for a noob, am I not?

Hehe, not at all. I'm scared of 'somehow' passing the redline too. however I think mine is rev-limited. The auto trans. wont let it go over 6k, which is pretty low, but man when it gets up there I start to get a chill down my back, cause it feels like something's gonna 'splode. Thing is...I have no idea what my 'redline' actually is...but this is what i surely dont want to take it past...if I could even do it anyway.
I like having the tach in my car now, lets me see how its doing, and if it's idling properly, or even running...lol

[comingbackdown]

Wow... i'm rather opinionated for a noob, am I not?

Hehe, not at all. I'm scared of 'somehow' passing the redline too. however I think mine is rev-limited. The auto trans. wont let it go over 6k, which is pretty low, but man when it gets up there I start to get a chill down my back, cause it feels like something's gonna 'splode. Thing is...I have no idea what my 'redline' actually is...but this is what i surely dont want to take it past...if I could even do it anyway.
I like having the tach in my car now, lets me see how its doing, and if it's idling properly, or even running...lol

I prefer a standard, but... There's one automatic that's blown my mind...
My mom's Eagle Vision. That thing could smoke half the cars in this town easy... It has some problems due to a fire under the hood a few months back, but... That thing is faaaaaaast... Not as fast as it used to be though... Needs a nice cleanup, tune-up, and several other things. It drives nice now that the alignment is dead on though.

And that's a great car for passing a semi on the interstate. I'd prefer a GTO though. That Eagle doesn't have a huge amount of horsepower. It has enough though. Now, a Talon would be a different story. Those things can get quite nasty. But I prefer a powerful machine... I operate on the philosophy of somebody who has taught me alot about cars though... My dad has taught me the mechanics, but my sister's boyfriend filled in quite a few blanks... He operates on "You have to respect the power of a powerful car. If you don't respect the power, the power won't respect you." In which case (as he's seen many many times) you total your car, or wind up as a giant smudge on the pavement. There's accident after accident there... Usually it's a young kid who has no idea how much power is really under that hood. I've seen a couple instances of that myself.

[jomotopia]

welcome to the site.

i wouldn't waste my time with Coldfusion (i hated coldfusion) if i was you, or even PHP unless you've definitely got to make things that won't be hosted on a Microsoft server. just go straight to ASP.NET. don't forget to learn database stuff too. i build web apps in C# for a living.

oh yeah and um, MT rocks!

[Nychold]

Best computer languages in the world to learn:

PHP
Java
C# (sadly...I really hate MS for this crap)
C++/C
Flash ActionScript (?)
GLSL and HLSL

You master those, you can pretty much write your own ticket anywhere in the world. (I still need C# and ActionScript. )

But welcome to the site. Always nice to meet a fellow coder.

[comingbackdown]

To both of you coders...

#1, I intend to put my own server online someday, and I won't use a microsoft server due to security problems. At least, not unless I have to. IIS isn't exactly secure... I've talked to a few hackers, and alot of the ones who just randomly target servers for defacement go looking for sites hosted on a server that's IIS driven... If they can hack a server running Unix as the OS, they can commit murder on a windows server. I don't think server 2003 is all that bad though. However, on what I'm learning, I'm going on the advice of more than one expert programmer/web designer. The fact of the matter is, I have to know languages that I can deploy on a non-Microsoft server, since I plan on going into business. If the client doesn't want to use the webhost that I recommend, I have to be flexible. (and some of the people I know are accusing me of not planning ahead)

#2, Flash is fun as a play toy, but my main info source for experienced knowledge is somebody that I really trust. He knows two guys who've been working with flash since the first beta version of it came out.
Neither one of those two guys will use flash for anything more than comedy or just for playing around. My biggest problem with flash is the fact that screen readers can't read it. So, somebody who's blind or sight impaired is sitting there wondering where the sound is coming from, and might not be able to see to stop it. Like those *** **** ****** ******* banner ads that make noise. I've had twelve tabs open, and had to go hunting for the one that had the banner ad on it...

Maybe I'm so against flash because of my friend... He's so insensitive...
Number one, he thinks that HTML is drab, pointless, and that it sucks.
He thinks that Javascript and CSS suck too. He learned enough of several programming languages to write "Hello world!" programs in all of them...
The only language he was ever truly good with was QBASIC. I still play with it just for the fun of it, but that is an outdated language...
And then came the final straw... He thinks flash is the god of web design...
Well, I got pissed off at him when I explained that screen readers skip it.
I had to explain what a screen reader does, and he goes "Why the hell would a blind/sight impaired person want to get on the internet? That's stupid and pointless. What good would it do them? It's a waste of time."

I, and the only other experienced coder in the room were both open mouthed and staring after that remark... I told a couple fellow coders about it, and I got two responses. "He's not even thinking in the real world..." and "What a little b*****d!" The kid thinks he's a real hot shot, but he can't even write actionscript... Neither can I, but... If he's so into flash, he should at least make it good...

I suppose I just made a little bit of a rant...

GLSL and HLSL? I have no freakin' idea... Never even heard of those...
My sister's boyfriend works on a Delphi development team. I'm not gonna say where though. I don't know how much I can say without getting into trouble... But, he's one of only two people on that team that can even write a line of C++. He even knows C. I'm impressed. I don't see too many programmers that know C. But I don't know alot of programmers, and especially not many who are over 20 years of age... But, my sister's boyfriend was writing programs when he was five... Later on in life, he wrote SGML... Now he does all sorts of things, but his job requires Delphi.

Thanks to all so far for the warm welcome.
Knowing that there are coders on this forum makes me smile.
By the by, I see a trend... My sister's boyfriend has an '06 Pontiac GTO.
That's where I got my enthusiasm for cars in general. I already loved my standard shift car before that though...

Wow... Long post...

[Nychold]

GLSL - GL Shading Language
HLSL - High Level Shading Language

I'm basically a graphics programmer, and eventually will be working in video games. But if you do anything with DirectX or OpenGL (which, if you do computer graphics, you eventually will), those two are musts. Both are about the same language, with a few additions to them, and very similar to C++ or Java.

I always like Delphi...if you mean Borland's Delphi. I'm a Borland nut...have been for years. Everything I own for programming is Borland.

Good luck getting the GTO. I love that car too, but it was way too expensive for me, not just in cost but in gas.

[hockeystyx16]

hey, welcome to the board.

where at in ohio are you?

[comingbackdown]

hey, welcome to the board.

where at in ohio are you?

Ashland county.

Thank you for the warm welcome.

[christian_piper]

Welcome! (I too am a noob..)

You seem to be very lucky- Being taught about cars.. I will not be able to learn stick until I get my car- This summer. But anyway, have fun, and WELCOME to this site to which I am new to myself!

[potownrob]

Welcome to the club