Programming 2 (PR2)

Lecture 1
Overview of Programming Languages
 Lecture outline
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Why so many languages?
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Programming language (PL) features
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What makes a good PL?
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Why study PLs?
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PL spectrum

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1 Why so many languages?
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Evolution
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Special purposes
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Personal perference

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2 PL features
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Expressive power
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Ease of use
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Ease of implementation
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Standardisation
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Open source
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Excellent compilers
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Economics, Patronage, and Inertia

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 PL features
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Expressive power ●
write clear, concise
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Ease of use & maintainable code
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abstraction
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Ease of implementation
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Standardisation
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Open source
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Excellent compilers
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Economics, Patronage, and Inertia

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 PL features
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Expressive power
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Ease of use ●
low learning curve
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Ease of implementation for beginning
programmers
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Standardisation
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Open source
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Excellent compilers
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Economics, Patronage, and Inertia

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 PL features
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Expressive power
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Ease of use
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Ease of implementation ●
suitable for average
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Standardisation machines
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Open source
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accessible (e.g. free
for educational use)
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Excellent compilers
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Economics, Patronage, and Inertia

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 A good PL is a compromise!
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Between the desires of programmer and PL
implementor
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Programmer: PL user
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language = means of expressing algorithms
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main concern: conceptual clarity
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PL implementor: PL designer/creator
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language = means of instructing computers
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main concern: implementation efficiency
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To achieve both concerns require making
compromises!
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 Donald E. Knuth (1938-)

programming be regarded as the art of telling

another human being what one wants the
computer to do

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3 Why study PLs?
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Know obscure features
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Understand different ways of expressing
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Help choose a PL for a given task
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Make it easier to learn new PLs
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Make good use of common development tools:
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debuggers, assemblers, linkers
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Add new useful features to a language
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Make better use of language technology

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 4 PL spectrum

declarative imperative

template- von object-

functional data flow logic scripting
based neumann oriented

Lisp/Scheme Id, XSL Prolog, C, Perl, Smalltalk,

ML Val T spreadsheet Ada, Python, Eiffel,
Haskell Fortran PHP Java

based on model of computation

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 Comparison
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Declarative language:
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focus more on programmer's than implementor's view
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describe what rather than how
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Imperative language:
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describe how a program is executed
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But the distinctions are not absolute:
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e.g. functional language can also have object-oriented
feature

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 Von Neumann language
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Computation:
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modification of variables
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Side effects:
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value of memory is changed in statements

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 Example: Gcd

int gcd(int a, int b) { // C

while (a != b) {
if (a > b) a = a - b;
else b = b - a;
}
return a;
}

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 Example: Gcd

static int gcd(int a, int b) { // Java

while (a != b) {
if (a > b) a = a - b;
else b = b - a;
}
return a;
}

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 Object oriented language
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Computation:
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interactions among semi-independent objects
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Object has internal state and procedures

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 Summary
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Many PLs exist because of evolution, purpose,
preference
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A good PL strikes a balance between
conceptual clarity and implementation
efficiency
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PL spectrum includes a categorisation of PLs
into declarative and imperative forms
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Study PLs help raise the awareness of and
choose suitable PL(s) for a given task

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