Computing Languages Overview
Computer languages can be categorized into three types.
- Machine Languages
- Low Level Languages
- Structured Languages
Machine Language
It is a machine language of 0’s and 1’s and is the most flexible of all languages, but machine dependent and not portable
Assembly Language
It is a low level language of 0’s and 1’s but mnemonic codes are assigned for ease of learning.
Like cp=10010000 to copy data.
Structured Languages
The Structured languages use three structures for writing programming code.
- Sequence structure
- Loop Structure
- Decision Structure
Every modern language uses above three structures with difference in syntax.
They are near to human language instructions usually in English.
Sequence Structure
In sequence structure the code lines are executed or run in sequence or order line by line.
For example BASIC Language code to display name on screen.
CLS
Print “Please Enter your name:” Input $name
Print “My Name is ” $name
End
Loop Structure
In Loop Structure the program lines are executed for specified times until a condition is true
CLS
For X=1 to 100
Print X
X=X+1
End For
End
The above code will be executed until X variable value is greater than 100.
Here FOR structure is used some languages uses DO WHILE or WHILE structure for loop.
Decision Structure
Decision Structure is for decision making.
For example the below code will take input from screen and display information upon input analysis.
Here IF structure is used
CLS
Print “Please your marital status S for single and M for married “
input $STATUS
IF $STATUS=”S” THEN Print “Single”
Else
IF $STATUS=”M” THEN PRINT “Married”
Else
Print “Not Valid Entry”
End
There are many structured languages few of them are:
BASIC
It stands for Beginners all purposes instructions code language.
It is English like language for easy understanding of beginners for various tasks like gaming, business and mathematical problems.
Pascal
Used for engineering and scientific calculations
FORTRAN
Stands for Formula Translation used for engineering and scientific calculations
COBOL
Stands for Common Business Oriented Language used for business applications
C Language
Developed by Bell lab used for system software development
C++
An extension of C Language uses OOP or object oriented programming for Application and system software.
OOP technology uses class structures for development as it uses existing codes/classes for re-use rather than to develop new one to reduce development time. Objects have properties and methods to handle them.
Visual BASIC
Extension of BASIC Language uses OOP designed for application development.
Java
It is like C++ designed to develop web page development and make them interactive through database linkages.
HTML
Stands for Hyper Text Markup Language used for web page development.
Joomla
Developed for Internet based applications.
PHP
Developed for Internet based server side applications
LISP
Stands for List processing developed for robotics.
All languages except machine language needs compilers to convert programming code into machine language of 1’s and 0’s understandable to machines.
Every language has its compiler made to convert it into machine code.
Some Languages uses interpreters and assembly language uses assembler to do these tasks.
