Best Programming Language - Page 3

Asher · September 21, 2002, 19:47

I'm surprised so many people like Java...

St Leo · September 21, 2002, 20:25

I love Java. It would be nice if it introduced "friendly" as a keyword and dropped the mandatory use of "public", but in all other respects it's perfect.

Asher · September 21, 2002, 20:33

You don't have a problem with how it handles input?

My school does Java whenever possible, since Jim Gosling (architect of the language and VP of Sun) graduated here and Sun heavily sponsers the school. It'd be nice to do more C++ actually.

Skanky Burns · September 21, 2002, 20:37

Input can be annoying, but if you just skip the rest of the input stream after getting input, it will work just like it should.

connorkimbro · September 21, 2002, 20:45

i voted for pascal, because that's all i know how to use.

I programmed my very own version of tetris using turbo pascal. hehe

DarthVeda · September 21, 2002, 20:53

You know C# would be a good language if it hadn't been labled as an "imperialist language invented by the most evil company in the world." It has several advantages over Java.

Urban Ranger · September 22, 2002, 08:23

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
I'm beginning to think you don't know much about what C# really is -- in what way is C# not a real high level programming language like Java? Is it because you have the OPTION of using unsafe and pointer operations? By default, and what they recommend you use, is very similar to Java. It compiles to an intermediate language, the runtime environment executes the program, has garbage collection, etc -- in what way is that form of it not a high level language? C# is great because you can use the high level language, or if you need to (for speed purposes), you can make it a native mid-level language like C++.

Glonkie,

One of the properties of real high level languages is it hides the details. Doing pointer arithematic is not hiding the details. Compiling to an intermediate code is not a property of a high level language, and neither having some kind of run time library for execution. Garbage collection can be, but it is not a sufficient one.

Just look at Pascal, would you?

Urban Ranger · September 22, 2002, 08:34

Quote:

Originally posted by yaroslav
In fact, I was on a debate with a friend that study Computer Science (I study Telecommunications Engineering) about it's better

1) To forbide unsafe operations (as you say, the can be more effeciente) and sacrify efficency on security altar

2) To allow unsafe operations (but It can translate on a longer writing and test time, because programer will use the unsafe operations when they don't need) After all, you know that programs always missused the language features

What do you think about that?

Other than as loin pointed out, it will also depend on the task on hand. Clearly choosing Java to write an OS or microcontroller control code is completely inappropiate, but you can use it to write a compiler. On the other hand, you are wacky if you want to write any high level applications in assembly and C - I view C as a preprocessor for assembly.

For the same task where you can choose a safe and an unsafe language, I will always choose the safe one. For one thing, even if you have some kind of wizard writing the original code, you can't hope to have some wizard doing the maintenace and everything else down the road. Who knows what the next person will add to it?

So, unless the task absolutely demands an unsafe language, which are really few and far between, my take is you should always use a safe langauge.

Urban Ranger · September 22, 2002, 08:36

Rah,

I suppose you don't like SPSS then.

Asher · September 22, 2002, 14:36

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Glonkie,

One of the properties of real high level languages is it hides the details. Doing pointer arithematic is not hiding the details. Compiling to an intermediate code is not a property of a high level language, and neither having some kind of run time library for execution. Garbage collection can be, but it is not a sufficient one.

Pointer arithematic is technically permitted in the language, but that's because there's two modes of operation for C#: Mid and high level. The mid level is much like C++, which allows you to use pointers and the like, the high level is very similar to Java.

Garbage collection and the fact that it runs interpreted are indeed traits of high level languages, defining traits at that. Maybe the definitions have changed since you've gone to school.

Adalbertus · September 22, 2002, 14:48

I'm not very much in favor of non-compiled languages. The argument "computers are sufficiently fast" is false in the sense that response times are very often unbearably long. The catastrophy of Windows 3.x isn't a good excuse for what follows.

Thue · September 22, 2002, 18:01

I needed to use ML for a project today - remended me how much I like that language. It feels so natural to make recursive code and it has a very mathematical feel to it. And it's type system is excellent - once I got it to compile it worked at once. Compare that to C...

(Guess who made that one vote on ML...)

Eroberer · September 22, 2002, 21:04

Hey, since I don't know a thing about this topic, but for some reason I am intensely interested in it, can I just do something totally different from the discussion, and ask what a couple of different programs were programmed in, and why? ...Assuming everyone's answer is yes, here I go:

What were these programmed in?:

1) Quake3
2) WindowsXP
3) MS Office XP (VisualBasic? ....why?)
4) Subzero (you know, the hacker program...)
5) Derive 5 (from Texas Instruments, which is basically like a TI-89 for your computer...it's a very good math program that lets you do symbolic integrals and derivatives, and limits and junk).
6) Doom 3
7) Doom 1
8) Ming =)

Asher · September 22, 2002, 21:12

I think Carmack codes in a mix of C++, C, and assembler (which covers DOOM 1, 2, 3, Quake 1, 2, 3, etc).

I think Windows XP and Office XP were both written in C++ too, actually, or perhaps a mixture.

The new versions of MS software coming out use a mixture of VB, C++, and C#, with the emphasisis being on C#.

Eroberer · September 22, 2002, 23:16

so what is the correct way to pronounce C#?

Asher · September 22, 2002, 23:18

C-sharp
like the music note

Urban Ranger · September 23, 2002, 01:43

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher

Pointer arithematic is technically permitted in the language, but that's because there's two modes of operation for C#: Mid and high level. The mid level is much like C++, which allows you to use pointers and the like, the high level is very similar to Java.

Any extension to C is still C, and C isn't a high level language.

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
Garbage collection and the fact that it runs interpreted are indeed traits of high level languages, defining traits at that. Maybe the definitions have changed since you've gone to school.

Maybe only in your book, Glonkie. Suppose I write a C interpreter, does that make C a high level language?

Asher · September 23, 2002, 01:47

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Any extension to C is still C, and C isn't a high level language.

C# isn't an extension to C in the same way the Java is not an extension of C. They're both extremely similar in syntax but are differnet beasts.

Quote:

Maybe only in your book, Glonkie. Suppose I write a C interpreter, does that make C a high level language?

No, but if you wrote a C interpreter that had garbage collection, didn't let you access machine specific stuff like pointers, it would be. Hey, do you know what that's called? QuakeC. And yes, it is a high level language.

Skanky Burns · September 23, 2002, 01:51

Quote:

Prolog 0%

My least favourite language.

Harovan · September 23, 2002, 04:00

C/C++ is it, of course. C# is from Microsoft and therefor has to be trash, per definition

. Java is a nice language to write portable "Hello World" samples and Minesweeper clones, but if one tries to write larger applications, they quickly get big and clumsy. Almost all operating systems and graphical desktops (such as Windoze) are written in C or C++ with a small part in Assembler. So are most of the games and newer business applications. Pascal has been good language for students, but in the last years lost this role to Java.

The other languages are of less importance or merely script languages. An exception are probably Cobol (not on the list) and Fortran, because of the large number of old business, banking and scientific applications, which still exist and are to maintain (yea, those that created the Y2K problems).

And my secret favorite (ANS Forth) isn't even on the ballot

.

Lemmy · September 23, 2002, 05:04

Quote:

C/C++ is it, of course. C# is from Microsoft and therefor has to be trash, per definition

i thought C++ was also a Microsoft thing.

Quote:

Java is a nice language to write portable "Hello World" samples and Minesweeper clones, but if one tries to write larger applications, they quickly get big and clumsy.

Except for some GUI parts maybe, i don't see why they would get bigger and clumsier then a C++ program.

Buck Birdseed · September 23, 2002, 05:20

C# is correctly pronounced "D Flat".

Harovan · September 23, 2002, 06:19

Quote:

Originally posted by Lemmy
i thought C++ was also a Microsoft thing.

Shhhhh! Bjarne Stroustrup could hear you.

Dry · September 23, 2002, 08:31

Quote:

Originally posted by Lemmy
i thought C++ was also a Microsoft thing.

It's the Visual *** that is TinyLimp stuff.

rah · September 23, 2002, 08:33

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Rah,

I suppose you don't like SPSS then.

Yes, I hate it. And the Ironic thing is that even though I hate it and rarely use it, I'm the primary SPSS support person in the Company. I handle all the contracts and we spend 10x the money on SPSS over SAS

RAH
Sometimes when I'm feeling evil and people call will SPSS questions/problems, I just say use SAS. Somehow though, they don't appreciate my humor.

Urban Ranger · September 23, 2002, 12:18

But why use both? You should use your position of head geek to do something about the situation

Seneca · September 23, 2002, 13:47

Quote:

Originally posted by loinburger

Unix:

Code:

     % ls
     foot.c foot.h foot.o toe.c toe.o
     % rm * .o
     rm: .o: No such file or directory
     % ls
     %

Oh dear, I've done stuff like that many times, and I've still got rm aliased to rm -f...

rah · September 23, 2002, 13:59

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
But why use both? You should use your position of head geek to do something about the situation

Head geek can't control clients. If they want SPSS datasets or tables, they get SPSS datasets or tables.
But all the hardcore programmers are directed to use SAS. (which they follow happily) None-programmers(brain dead people) prefer SPSS.

Unfortunately our call centers use other SPSS software applications that feed data to SPSS better.

But as far as I'm concerned. SPSS is just SAS lite.