which language to start with

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PaulC1972 wrote:

Well, C/C++ have been around for sometime, and I am sure they probably still be around 10 years from now

"Around" and "fully supported" are two different things. Tell Microsoft you'd like to write straight "C" applications and see what kind of response you get. It took a lawsuit just to get them to publish the flat interface for GDI++!

[El Corazon]

The Grand Negus wrote:

English will still be English

Will that be the Queens English? American English? Californian dialect? Texas Drawl? Southern? Bostonian? New York and Jersey variants? or perhaps even the slavic influences of the northern border states? Just which English will you use.... oh yeah.... YOUR decision on what English should be, what limitations, what syntax, and no other.... PAL will be a trained dog with far less sense.

_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)

[Paul Conrad]

Jeffry J. Brickley wrote:

Californian dialect? Texas Drawl?

:->

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If you try to write that in English, I might be able to understand more than a fraction of it. - Guffa

[El Corazon]

put them in the same room and watch the fireworks!!! hey... new years is coming up... hmmmmmm

_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)

[Paul Conrad]

The Grand Negus wrote:

Tell Microsoft you'd like to write straight "C" applications and see what kind of response you get

:zzz: Who cares what Microsoft thinks? They won't listen to me, personally, but if millions of developers start saying they want C, they will get C. It's all about being market driven...

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If you try to write that in English, I might be able to understand more than a fraction of it. - Guffa

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Christian Graus wrote:

'I said fish, and PE understood me'.

Actually, the Cal Monet "understood". The fact that he used a combination of internal mechanisms, originating in a variety of programming languages, doesn't really matter, does it? You said "fish" and you got one.

Christian Graus wrote:

You rely on google, which I presume was not written in PE.

We'd rather say, "The Cal Monet relies on the shared memories of his brethren around the world." And though Google's code was not written in Plain English, there's no reason why it couldn't be.

Christian Graus wrote:

OK, that's reasonable. If it can be made more flexible than it is now, then over time, I can see powerful, real world applications for it.

Thanks. Gotta start somewhere; we're at Kitty Hawk. The thing is heavier than air but it gets off the ground and we really are able to steer it a bit.

Christian Graus wrote:

The big question is, if you write a fat old English parser that turns English in to code, and the rules become loose, how will you know exactly what a line of code is going to do ?

Pretty much the same way we know that the term "height" in, say, a Pascal program, will be interpreted as a field in a record because of the enclosing "with" clause, rather than as a local variable, a parameter, a parameter in the enclosing parent routine, a global variable, or a function call. And y'know, sometimes we guess wrong; then we know by testing the thing. When I say to the PAL 3000, "Turn on the light" and he thinks I mean the reading lamp rather than the overhead fixture, that's not a bug - I gave him an ambiguous statement and he did his best to interpret and execute it. So then I then say, "Not that one, the other one" and get the desired result. I have the same problem with my wife and kids on occasion... Which is exactly the point I want to make. If we try to build a perfect machine that is immune to user error and that understands anything and everything perfectly, we're not going to get anything built at all. But starting somewhere is almost always a good idea. It seems that many of the people on this site would have told the Wright brothers, had they the chance, to go back to the bicycle shop since their "plane" couldn't cross the Atlantic with 400 passengers in less than 8

[123 0]

Jeffry J. Brickley wrote:

What you have done is less than COBOL did and less important.

But why do you feel so compelled to keep telling us so?

[Paul Conrad]

Jeffry J. Brickley wrote:

put them in the same room and watch the fireworks!!! hey... new years is coming up...

Oh yeah :-D

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If you try to write that in English, I might be able to understand more than a fraction of it. - Guffa

[Paul Conrad]

The Grand Negus wrote:

Quick Pascal on DOS

I still have it somewheres in my dinosaur digs :->

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If you try to write that in English, I might be able to understand more than a fraction of it. - Guffa

[El Corazon]

The Grand Negus wrote:

But why do you feel so compelled to keep telling us so?

Because you come here, touting your software to visitors and regulars, like a pimp searching for a customer. What you are doing is taking advantage of inexperience of some people for personal gain. You offer the primrose path, but deliver the fertilizer that makes it grow.

_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)

[123 0]

PaulC1972 wrote:

It's all about being market driven...

Which is why, setting out on a decades-long development project, we chose English as our programming language. We don't want our tools, techniques, and overall progress to be unduly influenced by fluctuations in the market place. And we're back to where we started.

[Jeremy Falcon]

Amar Chaudhary wrote:

what do you suggest

I think it should depend on what he wants to achieve with his programs first. Does he want to make games, web apps, DB apps, etc.?

Jeremy Falcon A multithreaded, OpenGL-enabled application.[^]

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PaulC1972 wrote:

The Grand Negus wrote: Quick Pascal on DOS I still have it somewheres in my dinosaur digs

Possibly the only product ever sold by Microsoft that was worth the price.

[Paul Conrad]

The Grand Negus wrote:

was worth the price

It was. If I recall, like $40 back in 1992 :) Still have Borland's Turbo Pascal around the dino digs, too :)

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If you try to write that in English, I might be able to understand more than a fraction of it. - Guffa

[Christian Graus]

The Grand Negus wrote:

The fact that he used a combination of internal mechanisms, originating in a variety of programming languages, doesn't really matter, does it? You said "fish" and you got one.

That is true, in terms of software architecture.  Is it true, in terms of a language example ? I'm not sure, not without a more clear explanation of what it does.

The Grand Negus wrote:

"The Cal Monet relies on the shared memories of his brethren around the world."

In other words, your main focus is marketing ? :P

The Grand Negus wrote:

I have the same problem with my wife and kids on occasion...

ROTFL !!!!

The Grand Negus wrote:

But starting somewhere is almost always a good idea

The Grand Negus wrote:

The thing is heavier than air but it gets off the ground and we really are able to steer it a bit.

This is a perfectly valid statement, I guess the real question is, did the Wright brothers sell tickets, and claim to offer a New York to London service ? In other words, is your product right now mature enough for people to choose it as a platform ? I don't know the answer, but if we're going to make allowances and say 'that's impressive progress as a starting point', doesn't that at least temper the places we'd say it was currently useful ?

The Grand Negus wrote:

But with full sanction and support from Microsoft?

What do I care about that ? Microsoft will not, cannot withdraw or stop MFC from working ( assuming I wanted to use MFC ).  To be honest, I am happy to change languages, any language I have used, will continue to work in the form I found it, but new languages represent new ideas and new frameworks.  Change for it's own sake is bad, so is insisting that no change occurs, however.

The Grand Negus wrote:

Wait 'til I wake up? Ask my son? Again, we have to start somewhere. Arguing against Plain English because it is new and doesn't have an established user base is like arguing that no one should have bought a Ford in 1905 because there were more blacksmiths than gasoline stations.

Again, your point is valid.  My question is, if we're going to recognise that an important step has

[123 0]

Christian Graus wrote:

I guess the real question is, did the Wright brothers sell tickets,

Don't know. I'm sure, however, that they used their demonstration to promote interest and investment in their enterprise. Perhaps they called it a "proof of concept" or a "first step in the right direction". Incidently, we use these very phrases to describe our product in the two-page manifesto that has been available as a PDF on our website from the very beginning. But let me hasten to add that if a group of users asked us to develop an application for them, we would - without hesitation - use Plain English to do so. In this sense, the product is "ready for prime time". For us, at least, it is the development tool of choice.

Christian Graus wrote:

Again, your point is valid. My question is, if we're going to recognise that an important step has been taken in a direction that could prove very useful in the future, is that the same as saying that people should be adopting this fledgling technology *right now* ?

Clearly, it's not the same. But "not ready as a plug-in replacement for Visual Studio" and "not ready for anything" are two very different things, as well. The program is both very broad and very deep. It addresses issues ranging from installation programs to interface design, from color palettes to scroll bars. And it takes anyone who studies it from the heights of natural language expression to the depths of native-code executables.

Christian Graus wrote:

Or merely watching it with interest, and perhaps, taking part for the sake of future usefulness ?

Either is fine with us.

[Christian Graus]

The Grand Negus wrote:

I'm sure, however, that they used their demonstration to promote interest and investment in their enterprise

No doubt.  And plainly, it was the sort of enterprise that would generate interest pretty easily.

The Grand Negus wrote:

Incidently, we use these very phrases to describe our product in the two-page manifesto that has been available as a PDF on our website from the very beginning.

Perhaps.  I'm asking ( and I'm really asking, not attacking or trying to flame ), does that description gel with the idea of recommending it to anyone who asks for a programming language ?

Christian Graus - C++ MVP 'Why don't we jump on a fad that hasn't already been widely discredited ?' - Dilbert

[123 0]

Christian Graus wrote:

The Grand Negus wrote: Incidently, we use these very phrases to describe our product in the two-page manifesto that has been available as a PDF on our website from the very beginning. Perhaps.

Perhaps? Take half a minute, click on the thing, and see for yourself!

Christian Graus wrote:

I'm asking ( and I'm really asking, not attacking or trying to flame ), does that description gel with the idea of recommending it to anyone who asks for a programming language?

We (obviously) think so. Firstly, because it presents a credible challenge to a number of preconceived and virtually unassailable notions that, we believe, need questioning. The program works - conveniently and efficiently - without icons, radio buttons, scroll bars, dialog boxes, tear-off palettes, objects, nested ifs, nested loops, artificial syntax, and a variety of other commonplace gadgets and constructs. At worst, that should rank it in the "surprising" category. At best, "an example to emulate". We, in our typically modest way, usually say something like, "thought provoking" or "worthy of study". But its certainly something that any programmer - beginner or professional - should be interested in for its educational value alone. Secondly, because we really believe that Natural Language programming is the way of the future; all other languages are doomed except as "sub-languages for special purpose assignments". As the current crop of "high-level" languages have made assembler programming all but unnecessary, so will future, "high_er_-level" languages do the same to the current crop. And finally because it's our language of choice; we like it best and feel compelled to tell others how great we think it is. But note that it's not the only thing we recommend. I've recommended DarkBasic on this sight many times to game developers - even bought a copy for a kid who asked for one here. We've also recommended Wirth's Oberon as worthy of study on numerous occasions. In this very thread I seconded Shog's recommendation of FORTH, even offering a free (and hard-to-find) book on the subject to a serious student. Besides, it's an offer. The individual can take it or leave it, now or later. Really quite harmless to my way of thinking, and possibly helpful.

[Christian Graus]

The Grand Negus wrote:

Perhaps? Take half a minute, click on the thing, and see for yourself!

I meant, I believe you, but I'm not sure that the claims you're making here are consistent with that attitude.

The Grand Negus wrote:

Firstly, because it presents a credible challenge to a number of preconceived and virtually unassailable notions that, we believe, need questioning.

To be honest, in it's present form, I disagree.  Right now, it's another language, with another syntax, that attempts to be more English *like*.  The rules of grammar look strict to me, based on the code sample I downloaded.  It's really no different, in this form, to VB or C#, unless the sample is over strict in it's grammar.

The Grand Negus wrote:

The program works - conveniently and efficiently - without icons, radio buttons, scroll bars, dialog boxes, tear-off palettes, objects, nested ifs, nested loops, artificial syntax, and a variety of other commonplace gadgets and constructs.

So, you're questioning the way GUI apps in general are written, as well as syntax ? Obviously, this program needs a blank screen to draw on, a textbox and some buttons.  Were I to write it in C#, I'd use the same elements.  In fact, the code DOES have constructs to replace things like loops.  And, sometimes nesting a loop makes sense, unless your language can translate things like 'for every pixel in the picture', 'for every field in the collection of objects', and any other variation that may come up, in time.  Either way, if your language doesn't ALLOW nested loops, then that is a serious limitation.  If it's like English, I should be able to tell it to do whatever I want it to.

The Grand Negus wrote:

At worst, that should rank it in the "surprising" category.

That a program that takes text, searches google and applies an image filter uses a textbox and a button is hardly surprising.

The Grand Negus wrote:

Secondly, because we really believe that Natural Language programming is the way of the future;

That seems possible.  And, it's in this, that your work is a valid first step, sure.

The Grand Negus wrote:

all other languages are doomed except as "sub-languages for special

[123 0]

Christian Graus wrote:

To be honest, in it's present form, I disagree. Right now, it's another language, with another syntax, that attempts to be more English *like*. The rules of grammar look strict to me, based on the code sample I downloaded. It's really no different, in this form, to VB or C#, unless the sample is over strict in it's grammar.

The "credible challenge" includes not only the language itself, but the "package" it comes in. When we first introduced it, several people here literally doubted whether a compiler that could re-create itself in less than 3 seconds could even exist. Really. That's a preconceived notion that comes from working with grossly inefficient products that needs to be questioned. The fact that we've developed a workable interface without any of the usual widgets is another example. The fact that the entire thing - interface, file manager, hex dumper, text editor, compiler/linker, and wysiwyg page editor fits in a 800 _kilo_byte executable - with no external runtime libraries - is a third. The fact that there isn't a single nested IF or nested loop in the whole program is a fourth. Need I go on? Now regarding the language itself, there are several significant things that differentiate it from VB or C#. First and foremost, the language is not object-oriented; yet it has been conveniently used to produce a reliable and efficient program of considerable complexity. Secondly, it uses a mechanism for naming things that is unique and very close to real-world naming techniques - I know of no other programming language that approaches the problem in this manner. Thirdly, the keywords of this language are the same as the keywords of the natural language English - words like articles, prepositions, and conjunctions; not arbitrary (and linguistically unimportant) terms like "private" or "volitile" or "delegate". Need I go on?

Christian Graus wrote:

So, you're questioning the way GUI apps in general are written, as well as syntax ?

Yes. See above. These things need to be questioned, but in a credible way. The credibility that we offer is a full-blown application that actually implements our thoughts on the matter; a concrete representation of "ideas" that actually runs.

Christian Graus wrote:

In fact, the code DOES have constructs to replace things like loops.

Of course it does. The c