Matlab was originally written in Fortran, then rewritten in C, and it
has much in common with both of them, moreso with C. (That heritage is
one reason that one can link code written in Fortran or C into Matlab
for faster execution.) But if one's goal is proficiency with Matlab,
there's nothing wrong with simply learning Matlab from the get-go - no
need to start with another language.
Russ Poldrack's comment about debugging bears emphasis - proficiency in
writing code depends greatly on having made common mistakes so many
times that most bugs become easy to fix, because one recognizes the
symptoms. Because debugging is otherwise so frustrating, most people get
ground down quickly. Besides maintaining faith that frustration will
drop with experience, an important bit of advice is to identify a
colleague who won't mind helping the novice.
Gregory A. Miller
University of Illinois, Champaign
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