The Evolution of Computer Languages
(A Brief History- Part-I)
Machine Language
The
computer’s own binary-based language, or machine language, is difficult for
human beings to use. The programmer is required to input every command and all
data in binary form. Machine-language programming is such a tedious, time-consuming
task that the time saved in running the program rarely justifies the days or
weeks needed to write the program. Machine languages are the most primitive
types of the computer language.
High-Level
Languages:
The high-level languages use English words such as OPEN, LIST, and PRINT, which might
stand for an array of instructions. These commands are entered via a keyboard
or from a program in a storage device.
Click Me to Explore
Detailed description of the Computer and its Components.
(Input Units)
A Complete and Detailed Definition with examples of Output
Devices (New Tech based)
The Central Processing Unit (CPU) Latest Enquiries
Memory Unit (I/O) Devices by Farrukh
The Basic Terminologies of Computer by Md. Farrukh Asif
Generation of Computer by Md. Farrukh Asif
The Evolution of Computer Languages(Part-I) by Md. Farrukh
Asif
The Evolution of Computer Languages(Part-II) by Md. Farrukh
Asif
Computer Network Topologies
By Md. Farrukh Asif
Communication Protocols
by “Md Farrukh Asif”
Basic Computer's Features and Use by Md. Farrukh Asif
Operating System and its Functionality: by Md. Farrukh Asif
Batch OS and Time Sharing OS by Md. Farrukh Asif
Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS): Explained Simply
The Wider
Use of Microkernel and its Components in OS
Fundamentals of Computer MCQs with Answers
Historical Landmarks
Programming
has its origin in the 19th century when the first “programmable” looms and
player piano scrolls were developed.
This
followed the punch cards encoded data in the 20th century that was used to direct mechanical processing. In the 1930s and early 1940s lambda calculus remained influential in language design.
The decade
of the 1940s has many landmarks to its credit in the initial development of modern
computers and programming languages.
At the
beginning of this decade, the first electrically powered digital computers were
created. The first high-level programming language to be designed for a
computer was Plankalkül, developed for the German Z3 by Konrad Zuse
between 1943 and 1945.
Programmers
of early 1950s computers, notably UNIVAC-I and IBM-701, used machine language
programs, that is, the first generation language (1GL).
Grace Hopper
is credited with implementing the first commercially oriented computer
language. After programming an experimental computer at Harvard University, she
worked on the UNIVAC I and II computers and developed a commercially usable
high-level programming language called FLOW-MATIC.
The 1GL
programming was quickly superseded by similarly machine-specific, but mnemonic,
second-generation languages (2GL) known as assembly languages or “assembler”.
Later in the
1950s, assembly language programming, which had evolved to include the use of
macro instructions, was followed by the development of “third generation”
programming languages (3GL), such as FORTRAN, LISP, and COBOL.
IBM in 1957 developed
a language that would simplify work involving complicated mathematical formulas
known as FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslator).
FORTRAN was
the first comprehensive high-level programming language that was widely used.
In 1957, the Association for Computing Machinery in the United States started
development of a universal language that would correct some of FORTRAN’s
shortcomings.
Next year
they released ALGOL (Algorithmic Language), another scientifically oriented
language. This was followed by LISP. Originally specified in 1958, lisp is the
second-oldest high-level programming language in widespread use today; only
FORTRAN is older.
Lisp is a
family of computer programming languages with a long history and a distinctive fully parenthesized syntax. COBOL (Common Business-Oriented Language), a
commercial and business programming language, concentrates on data organization
and file-handling and is widely used today in business.
3GLs are
more abstract and are “portable”, or at least implemented similarly on
computers that do not support the same native machine code. Updated versions of
all of these 3GLs are still in general use, and each has strongly influenced
the development of later languages.
At the end
of the 1950s, the language formalized as ALGOL 60 was introduced, and most
later programming languages are, in many respects, descendants of ALGOL. The
format and use of the early programming languages were heavily influenced by the
constraints of the interface.
BASIC
(Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) was developed in the early 1960s
for use by non-professional computer users.
LOGO was
developed to introduce children to computers. C, a language Bell Laboratories designed
in the 1970s, is widely used in developing systems programs, as is its
successor, C++.
Other
languages have been developed to permit programming in Internet applications.
The most popular is Java, an Object-Oriented programming language introduced in
1995 by Sun Microsystems. Java enables the distribution of both the data and
small applications called applets.
These
applets could be transmitted over the internet. The specialty of Java was that it
is machine-independent and can run on any kind of computer.
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