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Re: Low-level vs. High-level programming (was My First Computer)
- Subject: Re: Low-level vs. High-level programming (was My First Computer)
- From: "Randy McLaughlin" <randy@nospam.com>
- Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2003 17:50:01 -0500
- Newsgroups: comp.sys.cbm, comp.sys.apple2, rec.games.video.classic, comp.os.cpm
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"Sam Gillett" <samgillett@msn.com> wrote in message
news:wWqIa.826$vB.553@nwrddc03.gnilink.net...
>
> Randy McLaughlin wrote ...
>
> >"wildstar" <wildstar128@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>
> [arguments snipped]
>
> Wildstar, you are being a little too rigid with your definition of
> programming language. Please remember when you thought that Lisa's
> definition of workstation was too rigid.
>
> First to be a programming language, it must be usable for programming.
Here
> is a dictionary definition of programming; n. 1. The designing,
scheduling,
> or planning of a program.
>
> Some one correct me if I'm wrong, but ENIAC was programmed using jumper
> wires. Therefore, either jumper wires are a programming language, or
ENIAC
> was not a computer.
>
> BTW, ENIAC could not play pong, so by the Wildstar definition it could not
> have been a computer.
>
> Randy, I would call HTML a computer language, but I'm not sure if I would
go
> so far as to call it a programming language.
>
> HTML does little more than display a page without help from scripting
> languages. I can create a page with pen and paper, so is the ink in my
> ballpoint a programming language?
As I have stated many times I am using a rigid (black and white) definition
of programming. A pen and paper fails it has no sequence and it has no
instructions. That is why I keep bringing up an early programming example:
looms. The cards that program looms are sequenced and the cards do contain
instructions. It amuses me that people insist on referring to HTML tags and
refuse to see that the tags are instructions. People use the vernacular
term of programming to exclude everything but C and a few other languages.
Someone said you can not have a true definition of programming just as there
is no definition of the sky being blue. Not true the blue sky can be
explained to a blind person using mathematical terms and dictionaries have
the definition of programming. The blind person may never be able to enjoy
the beauty of the sky, but colors do have a definition. They are given in
angstroms.