I'm not Markus, but I can answer some of these:
C++ is the programming language, Microsoft Visual C++ is a program with the compiler for the language among other items (designed to allow you to program Microsoft Windows applications fairly easily) and yes you have to buy it (Amazon has it at about $100.00).
In general learning your first computer language is the hardest one, then it becomes much easier and you become able to teach yourself any (almost any) other languages using a book or tutorial. Assuming you have some experience just search on the net for Visual C++ tutorials and message boards these can be of great help.
If you haven't learned any languages yet or just want to mess around and see what you can do, I would look for a free compiler, you have to do some digging but you can find them, this will give you something to mess around on, without an outlay of money being involved. Then if you feel comfortable or enjoy the programming or need advanced capabilities (most free compilers are pretty bare bones) then worry about possibly picking something up. (If you are a student look into taking a programming language, many high schools have at least one programming class and almost any college has many, if its your first language, I'd recommend C which will facilitate your move to C++, although any language will teach you the basic principles of programming).
You can find some free C++ compilers here:
<a href="http://www.cprogramming.com/compilers.html" target="_blank">http://www.cprogramming.com/compilers.html</a>
The site also has several tutorials and I've used the board when I got stuck on things in the past.
Hope this helps, good luck.
[code] In the future you might want to only post this once (instead of every 4 hours
),
now you'll have to surf between both your threads trying find out the information you wanted
rather than looking for it in one easy to find space. (You could have edited your
original posts title to get Markus's attention if you so desired)
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[ January 24, 2002: Message edited by: ScottVib ]</p>