Re: Important features not highlighted on main page
- Posted by _tom (admin) Jun 23, 2017
- 1986 views
If I grab ideas from Pete I end up with:
A Euphoria language "is based on simple coherent intentional design." The symptoms of a Euphoria language are:
- simple is better
- two fundamental data-types
- safety, pointer, memory, and garbage issues are handled for you
- no surprises, coherent design and performance
- helpful bug reporting
- readable
- maintainable
- interpreted and compiled
A Euphoria language is convenient if you focus on solving the problem, rather than solving the solution.
Euphoria languages are proven:
- Euphoria since 1993 by Robert Craig
- OpenEuphoria open source and free
- Phix is Pete’s Self Hosted Hybrid Interpreter/Compiler
while I was at it I classified all other languages . . .
Programming is about data and actions on data.
Data is "numerical information" because computers can only work with numbers. Action is "what you can do with your data." Typical actions include: saving data in a file, doing calculations, using the data to display images and videos, or any of things you know computers can do. A computer program "is a set of instructions that provides a computer with data and then requires actions on that data."
To learn a new computer language you have to identify how data is input|output and how to perform actions on that data.
Computer languages are a convenience invented to deal with ornery intractable computers. You can make a language "easy" in various ways. There is no point in arguing about the superiority of one language over another because you must deal with ornery intractable programmers. That is why there are thousands of programming languages available.
A hardware language "starts with 0 and 1 bits and then builds an interface to humans." Symptoms of a hardware language are:
- many data-types depending on how many bits are in use
- terse syntax that looks mathematical with {} marking blocks of code
- when counting the first value is zero
- efficient, but difficult to program
- often compiled
A hardware language is convenient if you wish to access computer internals.
A shortcut language "introduces clever tricks to make programming easier." The symptoms of a shortcut language are:
- variables are not declared
- duck-typing; a data-type changes with the form of a value
- operators and functions do different things depending on data values
- each shortcut means a new set of rules to memorize and use
- overall design is not coherent, but the shortcuts are great
- often OOP (Object Oriented Programming) features are included
- sometimes extra shortcuts are invented to make using shortcuts practical
- often interpreted
A shortcut language is convenient if you think like the language designer or take to the effort to learn to think like the designer.
A rational language "is based on a design principle." The symptoms of an rational language are:
- mathematical basis (functional language)
- structural basis (list processing language)
- central feature: pattern matching or logic processing
- often interpreted
A rational language is convenient if you have exotic or special problems to solve.
A Euphoria language "is based on simple coherent intentional design." The symptoms of a Euphoria language are:
- simple is better
- two fundamental data-types
- safety, pointer, memory, and garbage issues are handled for you
- no surprises, coherent design and performance
- helpful bug reporting
- readable
- maintainable
- interpreted and compiled
A Euphoria language is convenient if you focus on solving the problem, rather than solving the solution.
Euphoria languages are proven:
- Euphoria since 1993 by Robert Craig
- OpenEuphoria open source and free
- Phix is Pete’s Self Hosted Hybrid Interpreter/Compiler
_tom
