Lect 2.

introduction to programming languages

1. What is a programming language?  Why are there so many programming languages? 

What are the types of programming languages?  Does the world need new languages?

2. A programming language is a set of rules that provides a way of telling a computer what
operations to perform.  A programming language is a set of rules for communicating an
algorithm  It provides a linguistic framework for describing computations

3. PS — Introduction A programming language is a notational system for describing

computation in a machine-readable and human-readable form. A programming language is a
tool for developing executable models for a class of problem domains.

4. English is a natural language. It has words, symbols and grammatical rules.  A

programming language also has words, symbols and rules of grammar.  The grammatical
rules are called syntax.  Each programming language has a different set of syntax rules.

5. Why does some people speak French?  Programming languages have evolved over time
as better ways have been developed to design them. ◦ First programming languages were
developed in the 1950s ◦ Since then thousands of languages have been developed 
Different programming languages are designed for different types of programs.

6. High-level program class Triangle { class Triangle { ... ... float surface() float surface() return
b*h/2; return b*h/2; } } Low-level program LOAD r1,b LOAD r1,b LOAD r2,h LOAD r2,h MUL
r1,r2 MUL r1,r2 DIV r1,#2 DIV r1,#2 RET RET Executable Machine code
0001001001000101 0001001001000101 0010010011101100 0010010011101100
10101101001... 10101101001...

7. First Generation Languages  Second Generation Languages  Third Generation Languages

 Fourth Generation Languages  Fifth Generation Languages

8. Machine language ◦ Operation code – such as addition or subtraction. ◦ Operands – that

identify the data to be processed. ◦ Machine language is machine dependent as it is the only
language the computer can understand. ◦ Very efficient code but very difficult to write.

9. Assembly languages ◦ Symbolic operation codes replaced binary operation codes. ◦

Assembly language programs needed to be “assembled” for execution by the computer.
Each assembly language instruction is translated into one machine language instruction. ◦
Very efficient code and easier to write.

10. Closer to English but included simple mathematical notation. ◦ Programs written in source
code which must be translated into machine language programs called object code. ◦ The
translation of source code to object code is accomplished by a machine language system
program called a compiler.

11. Alternative to compilation is interpretation which is accomplished by a system program called

an interpreter.  Common third generation languages ◦ FORTRAN ◦ COBOL ◦ C and C++ ◦
Visual Basic

12. A high level language (4GL) that requires fewer instructions to accomplish a task than a third
generation language.  Used with databases ◦ Query languages ◦ Report generators ◦ Forms
designers ◦ Application generators
13. Declarative languages  Functional(?): Lisp, Scheme, SML ◦ Also called applicative ◦
Everything is a function  Logic: Prolog ◦ Based on mathematical logic ◦ Rule- or Constraint-
based

14. Though no clear definition at present, natural language programs generally can be
interpreted and executed by the computer with no other action by the user than stating their
question.  Limited capabilities at present.

15. Imperative Programming (C)  Object-Oriented Programming (C++)  Logic/Declarative

Programming (Prolog)  Functional/Applicative Programming (Lisp)

16. Two broad groups ◦ Traditional programming languages  Sequences of instructions  First,
second and some third generation languages ◦ Object-oriented languages  Objects are
created rather than sequences of instructions  Some third generation, and fourth and fifth
generation languages

17. FORTRAN ◦ FORmula TRANslation. ◦ Developed at IBM in the mid-1950s. ◦ Designed for
scientific and mathematical applications by scientists and engineers.

18. COBOL ◦ COmmon Business Oriented Language. ◦ Developed in 1959. ◦ Designed to be

common to many different computers. ◦ Typically used for business applications.

19. BASIC ◦ Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code. ◦ Developed at Dartmouth

College in mid 1960s. ◦ Developed as a simple language for students to write programs with
which they could interact through terminals.

20. C ◦ Developed by Bell Laboratories in the early 1970s. ◦ Provides control and efficiency of
assembly language while having third generation language features. ◦ Often used for system
programs. ◦ UNIX is written in C.

21. Simula ◦ First object-oriented language ◦ Developed by Ole Johan Dahl in the 1960s. 
Smalltalk ◦ First purely object-oriented language. ◦ Developed by Xerox in mid-1970s. ◦ Still
in use on some computers.

22. C++ ◦ It is C language with additional features. ◦ Widely used for developing system and
application software. ◦ Graphical user interfaces can be developed easily with visual
programming tools.

23. JAVA ◦ An object-oriented language similar to C++ that eliminates lots of C++’s problematic
features ◦ Allows a web page developer to create programs for applications, called applets
that can be used through a browser. ◦ Objective of JAVA developers is that it be machine,
platform and operating system independent.

24. Scripting Languages ◦ JavaScript and VBScript ◦ Php and ASP ◦ Perl and Python 
Command Languages ◦ sh, csh, bash  Text processing Languages ◦ LaTex, PostScript

25. HTML ◦ HyperText Markup Language. ◦ Used on the Internet and the World Wide Web
(WWW). ◦ Web page developer puts brief codes called tags in the page to indicate how the
page should be formatted.

26. XML ◦ Extensible Markup Language. ◦ A language for defining other languages.
27. Programming languages are languages  When it comes to mechanics of the task, learning
to speak and use a programming language is in many ways like learning to speak a human
language  In both kind of languages you have to learn new vocabulary, syntax and
semantics (new words, sentence structure and meaning)  And both kind of language require
considerable practice to make perfect.

28. Computer languages lack ambiguity and vagueness  In English sentences such as I saw
the man with a telescope (Who had the telescope?) or Take a pinch of salt (How much is a
pinch?)  In a programming language a sentence either means one thing or it means nothing

29. Formerly: Run-time performance ◦ (Computers were more expensive than programmers) 
Now: Life cycle (human) cost is more important ◦ Ease of designing, coding ◦ Debugging ◦
Maintenance ◦ Reusability  FADS

30. Writability: The quality of a language that enables a programmer to use it to express a
computation clearly, correctly, concisely, and quickly.  Readability: The quality of a
language that enables a programmer to understand and comprehend the nature of a
computation easily and accurately.  Orthogonality: The quality of a language that features
provided have as few restrictions as possible and be combinable in any meaningful way. 
Reliability: The quality of a language that assures a program will not behave in unexpected
or disastrous ways during execution.  Maintainability: The quality of a language that eases
errors can be found and corrected and new features added.

31. Generality: The quality of a language that avoids special cases in the availability or use of
constructs and by combining closely related constructs into a single more general one. 
Uniformity: The quality of a language that similar features should look similar and behave
similar.  Extensibility: The quality of a language that provides some general mechanism for
the user to add new constructs to a language.  Standardability: The quality of a language
that allows programs written to be transported from one computer to another without
significant change in language structure.  Implementability: The quality of a language that
provides a translator or interpreter can be written. This can address to complexity of the
language definition.