Best Programming Language

[Asher]

Yarr thar be the geeks.

Which programming language is best -- AND WHY!?

[Asher]

****
After I hit submit I rememeber COBOL. Oh well. That's what "Other" is for.

[Kirnwaffen]

"C makes it easy to shoot yourself in the foot. C++ makes it harder, but when you do, you blow your whole leg off" -Bjarne Strousup

Go C++

[Asher]

I voted C# as best overall. Far more forgiving (great for lazy programmers), faster development times, less debugging hassles, JIT compile mode, type-safe, etc.

C++ comes in second.

[Kirnwaffen]

I voted C++ because I haven't learned any C# yet

[loinburger]

C#?

I voted Java. I absolutely hate the stupid syntax that C++ makes you use, especially when you're making classes. Java would be perfect if they'd just let me compile my programs into executables.

[Juggernaut]

The only one I know is QBasic, which I've almost forgot completely since computer classes in elementary school. Was really fun though, as I recall it. I may had made a career out of it if I hadn't been so darn good at everything.

[Asher]

Originally posted by loinburger
C#?

I voted Java. I absolutely hate the stupid syntax that C++ makes you use, especially when you're making classes. Java would be perfect if they'd just let me compile my programs into executables.

You should look into C#.
It's better than Java, at least IMO. Let's you do stuff like overloading the operators, as well as compile to executables OR compile to run on a .NET CLR (think of it like the Java VM -- There is a working one in Windows XP, downloadable for other Windows versions, and Ximian is working on a *nix client).

Another thing C# has on Java: It's an open standard (and so are the runtime specs) submitted to the ISO, while Java's are both proprietary.

More info on C#: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/te...sharpintro.asp

[Mercator]

It depends on what you're making... But I guess you were rather hoping for furious flame wars between fanatic fans of different languages.

C, VB, Perl, Scheme (which is just a variation on Lisp, so you could have lumped those together) and Prolog are the languages I'm (more or less) familiar with.

Prolog is great for logic programming and a personal favorite of mine, although it can be awfully slow and is probably pretty useless for your average application.

Scheme is somewhat like Prolog, but I guess it's more generally applicable. I haven't used it in a long time, and I'm not quite sure what it's capable of.
Both Scheme and Prolog are very useful in my (sort of) field of AI. Scheme/Lisp mostly in the US, Prolog more in Europe.

VB is nice for making a quick and easy not too demanding little program.

C is a raw power low-level programming language, it can do just about anything, but can be pretty annoying with all the stuff you have to keep track of.

Perl would be my current language of choice (I just LOVE regular expressions)... It is C(++) without the fuss, and has a very natural syntax... I might be a biased here though, since I'm currently learning Perl, while I've only used VB recently beside that.

I guess C++ is superior to C, and C# kind of takes the best aspects of C++ and VB (right?), which makes it powerful and easy to use.

So I'd pick C# or Perl... But I've only heard people about C#, I haven't actually seen it (well, I probably have), let alone used it, so my vote goes to... Perl.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Mercator
C# kind of takes the best aspects of C++ and VB (right?), which makes it powerful and easy to use.

C# is more of a C++ meets Java. Takes the best of both worlds. It also has some added features like being able to interoperate with classes from VB and C++, you just gotta flag them as "unsafe".

There's also a really nice and very easy to use VB-like interface available in VS.NET for it.

[alofatti]

I have used lots of language in my job and in my studies, and after that I have concluded that there is no perfect language.
If I have to choose for an absolutely first language, I would probably go for a functional language like Haskell or ML. Programming with those languages is an absolute different thing than using common languages like Javs,Pascal, C, etc. Too bad they are somewhat limited in scope, mostly because they are not very known.
For a while, I liked Java but I have found a lot of irritating stuff in it which are better (but not completely solved) handled in C#.
I am starting to study Eiffel now, let´s see what results from it...

[Asher]

http://www.softsteel.co.uk/tutorials/cSharp/lesson2.html

C# versus Java

C# and Java are both new-generation languages descended from a line including C and C++. Each includes advanced features, like garbage collection, which remove some of the low level maintenance tasks from the programmer. In a lot of areas they are syntactically similar.

Both C# and Java compile initially to an intermediate language: C# to Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL), and Java to Java bytecode. In each case the intermediate language can be run - by interpretation or just-in-time compilation - on an appropriate 'virtual machine'. In C#, however, more support is given for the further compilation of the intermediate language code into native code.

C# contains more primitive data types than Java (lesson 4), and also allows more extension to the value types. For example, C# supports 'enumerators', types which are limited to a defined set of constant variables (lesson 7), and 'structs', which are user-defined value types (lesson 11).

Unlike Java, C# has the useful feature that we can overload various operators.

Like Java, C# gives up on multiple class inheritance in favour of a single inheritance model extended by the multiple inheritance of interfaces (lesson 11). However, polymorphism (lesson 14) is handled in a more complicated fashion, with base class methods either 'overriding' or 'hiding' super class methods

C# also uses 'delegates' - type-safe method pointers (see lesson 16). These are used to implement event-handling.

In Java, multi-dimensional arrays are implemented solely with single-dimensional arrays (where arrays can be members of other arrays. In addition to jagged arrays, however, C# also implements genuine rectangular arrays (lesson 6).

C# versus C++

Although it has some elements derived from Visual Basic and Java, C++ is C#'s closest relative.

In an important change from C++, C# code does not require header files. All code is written inline.

As touched on above, the .NET runtime in which C# runs performs memory management, taking care of tasks like garbage collection. Because of this, the use of pointers in C# is much less important than in C++. Pointers can be used in C#, where the code is marked as 'unsafe' (lesson 5), but they are only really useful in situations where performance gains are at an absolute premium.

Speaking generally, the 'plumbing' of C# types is different from that of C++ types, with all C# types being ultimately derived from the 'object' type (lesson 4). There are also specific differences in the way that certain common types can be used. For instance, C# arrays are bounds checked unlike in C++, and it is therefore not possible to write past the end of a C# array.

C# statements are quite similar to C++ statements. To note just one example of a difference: the 'switch' statements has been changed so that 'fall-through' behaviour is disallowed (lesson 10).

As mentioned above, C# gives up on the idea of multiple class inheritance. Other differences relating to the use of classes are: there is support for class 'properties' of the kind found in Visual Basic, and class methods are called using the . operator rather than the :: operator.

[loinburger]

Hmm, I ought to look into that. I've been meaning to learn Perl also, but apparently they're doing a major revamp of Perl for the newest version (making it more practical for me to learn it in a coupla months). This'll keep me busy while I wait for them to release the new Perl version and while I wait for the job market to stop sucking.

[Mercator]

I see... Yes, it was mostly the development environment I was thinking of.

I know my programming, but I'm not too good on the technical details, which also sums up my (small) dislike for C pretty well. I don't want to be bothered with things like memory-management, not to mention pointers.

[loinburger]

Anyhoo, I might as well repost this...

C:
You shoot yourself in the foot.

C++:
You accidently create a dozen instances of yourself and shoot them all in the foot. Providing emergency medical care is impossible since you can't tell which are bitwise copies and which are just pointing at others and saying, "that's me, over there."

Objective C:
You write a protocol for shooting yourself in the foot so that all people can get shot in their feet.

Ada:
If you are dumb enough to actually use this language, the United States Department of Defense will kidnap you, stand you up in front of a firing squad, and tell the soldiers, "Shoot at his feet."

-- or --

After correctly packaging your foot, you attempt to concurrently load the gun, pull the trigger, scream and shoot yourself in the foot. When you try, however, you discover that your foot is of the wrong type.

Algol (60 or 68):
You shoot yourself in the foot with a musket. The musket is esthetically fascinating, and the wound baffles the adolescent medic in the emergency room.

Algol 60:
You spend hours trying to figure out how to fire the gun since it doesn't have any provision for input or output.

Algol 68:
You mildly deprocedure the gun, the bullet gets firmly dereferenced, and your foot is strongly coerced to void.

APL:
You hear a gunshot, and there's a hole in your foot, but you don't remember enough linear algebra to understand what happened.

-- or --

You shoot yourself in the foot, then spend all day figuring out how to do it fewer characters.

Assembly language:
You crash the OS and overwrite the root disk. The system administrator arrives and shoots you in the foot. After a moment of contemplation, the administrator shoots himself in the foot and then hops around the room rabidly shooting at everyone in sight.

-- or --

You try to shoot yourself in the foot only to discover you must first reinvent the gun, the bullet, and your foot.

Basic:
Shoot self in foot with water pistol. On big systems, continue until entire lower body is waterlogged.

Visual Basic:
You'll shoot yourself in the foot, but you'll have so much fun doing it that you won't care.

Cobol:
USEing a COLT45 HANDGUN, AIM gun at LEG.FOOT, THEN place ARM.HAND.FINGER on HANDGUN.TRIGGER, and SQUEEZE. THEN return HANDGUN to HOLSTER. Check whether shoelace needs to be retied.

-- or --

You try to shoot yourself in the foot, but the gun won't fire unless it's aligned in column 8.

DBase:
You squeeze the trigger, but the bullet moves so slowly that by the time your foot feels the pain you've forgotten why you shot yourself anyway.

DBase IV version 1.0:
You pull the trigger, but it turns out that the gun was a poorly-designed grenade and the whole building blows up.

Eiffel:
You take out a contract on your foot. The precondition is that there's a bullet in the gun, the postcondition is that there's a hole in your foot.

Forth:
You yourself foot in shoot.

Fortran:
You shoot yourself in each toe, iteratively, until you run out of toes, then you read in the next foot and repeat. If you run out of bullets, you continue anyway because you have no exception-processing ability.

Java:
You shoot yourself in the foot. Everyone else who accesses your website leaves hobbling and cursing.

Lisp:
You try to shoot yourself in the foot, but the gun jams on a stray parenthesis.

-- or --

You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds...

Scheme:
You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds...
...but none of the other appendages are aware of this happening.

Pascal:
The compiler won't let you shoot yourself in the foot.

Modula-2:
After realizing that you can't actually accomplish anything in the language, you shoot yourself in the head.

Perl:
You shoot yourself in the foot. You then decide it was so much fun that you invent another six completely different ways to do it.

PL/I:
You consume all available system resources, including all the offline bullets. The Data Processing & Payroll Department doubles its size, triples its budget, acquires four new mainframes, and drops the original one on your foot.

-- or --

Since the bullet is a different type from your foot, the bullet automatically gets converted to another foot on arrival. It's still difficult to walk afterwards.

Prolog:
You attempt to shoot yourself in the foot, but the bullet, failing to find its mark, backtracks to the gun which then explodes in your face.

-- or --

You tell your program you want to be shot in the foot. The program figures out how to do it, but the syntax doesn't allow it to explain.

sh, csh, etc.:
You can't remember the syntax for anything, so you spend five hours reading man pages before giving up. You then shoot the computer and switch to C.

Smalltalk:
You spend so much time playing with the graphics and windowing system that your boss shoots you in the foot, takes away your workstation, and makes you develop in COBOL on a character terminal.

-- or --

You shoot yourself in the foot, and your foot sends "doesNotUnderstand: Pain" to your brain.

Snobol:
You grab your foot with your hand, then rewrite your hand to be a bullet. The act of shooting the original foot then changes your hand/bullet into yet another foot (a left foot).

-- or --

If you succeed, shoot yourself in the left foot. If you fail, shoot yourself in the right foot.

Paradox:
Not only can you shoot yourself in the foot, your users can too.

Revelation:
You'll be able to shoot yourself in the foot just as soon as you figure out what all these bullets are for.

English:
You put your foot in your mouth, then bite it off.

Clipper:
You grab a bullet, get ready to insert it in the gun so that you can shoot yourself in the foot, and discover that the gun that the bullet fits has not yet been built, but should be arriving in the mail REAL SOON NOW.

SQL:
You cut your foot off, send it out to a service bureau and when it returns, it has a hole in it, but will no longer fit the attachment at the end of your leg.

370 JCL:
You send your foot down to MIS with a 4000-page document explaining how you want it to be shot. Three years later, your foot comes back deep-fried.

Unix:

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

Concurrent Euclid:
You shoot yourself in somebody else's foot.

HyperTalk:
Put the first bullet of the gun into foot left of leg of you. Answer the result.

Motif:
You spend days writing a UIL description of your foot, the trajectory, the bullet, and the intricate scrollwork on the ivory handles of the gun. When you finally get around to pulling the trigger, the gun jams.