Higher-level language

[Kygron]

Out of curiosity, what are some high-level programming languages out there? It's been a few years since I heard of any. C++ and simmilar is all I know about. Are there any higher-level/easier languages? I'm asking more out of "what makes a high-level" than anything else. I remember C++ because when I was learning it there were many libraries being standardized to make it behave at a higher level.

 

Any ideas?

[Dapthar]

Out of curiosity, what are some high-level programming languages out there?

There's Java.

 

Not much else immediately springs to my mind besides C#, but that's a variant of C++.

[Aeternus]

Theres quite a few interpreted languages (and some not) that are quite high level and relatively easy to code in, such as Python, Perl, Ruby, Lisp, Haskell etc. Some are quite generic (Python) whereas those such as Lisp and Haskell look to have more specific purposes and don't look to be what i would consider on the beaten path (haven't look into them all that much). There are quite a few different programming languages listed here - http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/abc.html (although some are simply variations on the same language) and googling each (well ones that look interesting) will probably yeild their advantages and disadvantages.

[5614]

Personally I think of:

 

C, C#, C++, Java, Delphi & Visual Basics

 

as the high-level languages.

[Pangloss]

Most of the commercial/business development today seems to be split between Java, C#/C++ and (at the low end) Visual Basic. Certainly that encompasses the lion's share.

 

But the question of "what you intend to program" (or "what you need to do") is still of primary importance in making the decision of which language to use. Java, for example, has serious drawbacks for certain kinds of programming that prohibit its use, and the same certainly applies for the others.

 

I recommend a good book in programming languages, their construction and methodology, etc. Sebesta's "Concepts of Programming Languages" is pretty good. Thorough and current.

[gib65]

I'm asking more out of "what makes a high-level" than anything else.

 

In computer science, high level means how abstract the language is. The easy way to think of it is how close to plain English the language is (where VB would take the cake, in my opinion), whereas the low level languages are closer to 1's and 0's. The more complicated way of thinking of it is to image that all languages fall on a spectrum with 1's and 0's at one extreme and human language at the other (which, of course, doesn't exist as a programming language yet). The reason why we have high level languages is because nobody wants to program in 1's and 0's, and so languages that consisted of token-like keywords were invented to mimic something closer to human language. The first high level languages invented in the early days were called assembly languages, and it consisted of instruction sets that spoke in terms of the computer hardware - that is, store xxx at address yyy in memory, read address zzz, send data ddd through chip ccc, bit shift the result by 1, etc. In order for the computer to execute such programs they had to be compiled, which means converted into 1's and 0's which is really the only language computers really understand. This means that high level languages are built on top of low level languages and before execution, must be converted to low level languages. Eventually, even assembly became too cumbersome to program, and even higher level language evolved that were based on assembly. C and Fortran come to mind. These languages are characterized as being more abstract - so instead of instructing the computer on what to do physically, it tells it to carry out abstract operation such as add x plus y, print "hello world" to the screen, prompt the user for input, etc. Then, even higher level languages came along, such as C++ and Java, and most recently HTML and other web languages. All these high level languages are still based on low level languages in the end, and must be compiled or interpreted in order to be executed.

[Ndi]

Just an addition:

 

I (and I'm not alone) see most languages to be a flavour of one of the three mainstreams in syntax and approach. Mostly, there's the C-like (C, C++, C# and most likely Java), Pascal-Like (Pascal, Pascal OOP, Delphi) and Basic-like (Basic, -S, Visual, etc).

 

This is mostly because these three survived and they have quite a few fans. As a result most new languages follow, at least in part, the "feel" of these. Some follow their own, like HTML and derivates.

 

I'm personally attached to Pascal (Delphi) because I find it the easiest to read and understand, followed closely by C.

[rajama]

Wasn't it's use a requirement at some point for military systems or did that all go away / never work out?

[Aeternus]

Ada is still around isnt it? Its used in embedded systems isnt it? I think they use it at York Uni in the embedded systems course and i think its use is quite wide spread in that area.

[Kygron]

Ada also has its OOP version, Ada95.

 

---

 

so we have

binary->assembly with named instructions

assembly->midlevel with mathamatical notation and function building

midlevel->highlevel with OOP and code templates(as C++ calls them)

 

Interpreted languages allow self-modifying code (How often is it actually used?). Code re-use comes in many forms.

 

What other methods are available?