"Ahem A Rivet's Shot"  wrote
|
| > Currently javascript, which is not even a programming language
|
| How is JavaScript not a programming language ? Last I looked it
| fell into the "functional language" class of programming languages and has
| several stand alone implementations as well as being the default language
| for web page (dis)enhancement. It's not one I would choose but it most
| certainly is a programming language.
|

   It's an interesting situation. More and more, things
that people call "apps" are little more than webpages,
while webpages are often bigger than a medium-sized
software program -- bloated with 2+ MB of script. So
it's not as clear cut as it used to be. And I can see
how you might call js programming code. But then, why
not HTML? It's code. It's interpreted to produce a
useful result. CSS? Of course. AutoIt? Apple script?
If someone pastes a few lines of js code they found
online, along with a line to call in a copy of jquery, are
they programmers or inexperienced web designers?
Then should we say that any text, such as a
commandline, is programming, while clicking a button
is using?

  I used to know someone who spent his day using
Perl to move various files around on a big company
network. Is he a programmer? I'd call him a secretary.
I don't mean that smugly. I just mean that's really the
job he's doing. The actual code writing is minor,
menial work.
  He's not a programmer any more than a secretary is
a writer for using a typewriter. And he didn't call himself
a programmer. I guess he probably thought of himself
as a clerk.

  I'm currently working on a little HTA Windows utility,
powered by VBScript in IE, to clean up and reformat HTML
files that have been converted from PDF. I've made
similar tools to unpack program installers, extract icons;
I even wrote an image editor. It's fun, quick and easy.
The IE DOM is so powerful and adaptable that one can
basically write complex GUI software using only script.
But I wouldn't call VBScript a programming language.
It's simple, intepreted and most of its power comes from
using COM objects.
  At some level of wrapper it begins to seem misleading
to talk about programming.

  For me that's all the more relevant these days, as big
companies begin to create rental software. Much of that,
like Adobe CS or Office 365, is fullscale compiled desktop
software that pretends to be online in order to justify
rental fees. Other things are mostly online and act like
they're local.
  Then there are Java and .Net, in the middle, not actually
running directly on an OS platform. We can call those
programming code, but the distinction is important. A 2
MB editor written in C/C++ is a 2 MB editor. A 2 MB editor
written in Java or .Net is going to require that I install
an OS wrapper of hundreds of MB. It's really glorified,
OO script.

  So I don't have a problem with you calling js a programming
language, but I just call it a scripting language. A programming
language is something I'd use to write compiled software that
runs on top of an OS platform. And while I use a lot of software,
I have no intention of using Microsoft's Metro webpage-based
thingies.

  Ironically, for a lot of companies and programmers now,
writing to an OS API is viewed like a horse and buggy. People
are largely unaware that they're writing to levels of wrappers.
A lot of .Net programmers think they're using a newer, separate
API.
  I noticed recently with the Google and Bing REST APIs for
maps that compiled software is being "deprecated" and the
terms of use for various map services are vague when it
comes to compiled desktop software. Bing doesn't even allow
streetside images via REST.
  Those companies are so focused on services and ad income
from phones that their APIs have also become services of a kind.
You don't use a toolbox they've provided, as with an OS API.
Rather, you get a few simple tools that are designed to use
their services. The programmers, if you want to call them that,
are more like pizza delivery drivers where they used to be
pizza chefs.... But I suppose that once all pizza is microwaved
and delivered, a pizza delivery driver will be called a "chef".
And their status will be valorized by putting lots of obscure
words, curly brackets, and pointless semi-colons on their
uniforms. :)

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05