My husband desperately pestered me to help him get on track, so I ended up taking on the workings for CPU mining Monero. I'll admit to no programming experience, and only a vague understanding of computer commands. I must say that I was surprised that it wasn't as horrible experience as I thought it might be. It was easy to download, but it was near impossible how to decide which one to go with. I eventually ended up with Claymore, older but still good for CPU mining. (I've got quadcore and i5.)
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=647251.0 <<link to the forum post with all the info and where he has answered many questions and addressed issues.
After finally understanding how to open it, the 'Read me!!!', I get it loaded and find two issues. I have no idea how to set the commands, so I can change wallet address, and an error having to do with being an admin on the computer. TBH I still haven't solved the second issue, but that first one took me by surprise I guess?
So after brewing on it for 24 hours, I went to re-open it and noticed the edit file option...and that's where I set the command. Why was that so hard to put in all the sets of instructions that I saw??? Programmers I see commonly exclude the easy steps, and it's funny now. I remember reading the step-by-agonizing-step process displayed in all of the designing classes I attended in high school, and heck yeah I'd short hand.
But overall, it was a cool experience, and I'll probably get prodded for admitting it after my husband reads this. It's got twice the hash power I got on Minergate, and well that's pretty cool I guess, ha ha ha.