Chapter Objectives:

1. To discuss the evolution of programming languages.

2. To describe and contrast the various types of programming languages and their appropriate use.
3. To identify major programming paradigms with associated languages.

Pre-Test

Define the following comprehensively without looking through the module.

1. Programming
2. Programming Language
3. Programming Paradigm

Introduction
Computer programming languages allow us to give instructions to a computer in a language the
computer understands. Just as many human-based languages exist, there are an array of computer
programming languages that programmers can use to communicate with a computer. The portion of the
language that a computer can understand is called a “binary.” Translating programming language into
binary is known as “compiling.” Each language, from C Language to Python, has its own distinct features,
though many times there are commonalities between programming languages.

These languages allow computers to quickly and efficiently process large and complex swaths of
information. For example, if a person is given a list of randomized numbers ranging from one to ten
thousand and is asked to place them in ascending order, chances are that it will take a sizable amount of
time and include some errors.

History of Computer Programming Languages

Unlocking Difficulties

Compiler- A computer software that translates (compiles) Source code

written in a high-level language (e.g., C++) into a set of machine-language
instruction.
Language- Is a system of conventional spoken or written symbols by means
of which human beings as members of a social group and participants in
its culture express themselves.
History- Studies the chronological record of events.

What is Programming?
Programing- Is the process of developing and implementing various sets of instructions
to enable a computer to do a certain task.
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 The act of process of planning or writing a program.

 Written as a series of human understandable computer instructions that can be
read by a compiler and linker.

Programming languages are used to control the performance of the computer or machine. At present,
computer programmer has many choices to choose the language, but there are many differences between
programming languages. So, this article gives a brief information regarding what are the different types of
programming languages, differences between programming languages and types of programming languages
in useful ways.

What is Programming Language?

A programming language is a notation designed to connect instructions to a machine or a computer.

Programming languages are mainly used to control the performance of a machine or to express algorithms.
At present, thousand programming languages have been implemented. In the computer field, many
languages need to be stated in an imperative form, while other programming languages utilize declarative
form. The program can be divided into two forms such as syntax and semantics. Some languages are defined
by an SO standard like C language.

History of Programing language

The first programming language
Did you know that the first-ever computer programming language was invented way back in 1843?
Ada Lovelace came up with the first-ever machine algorithm for an early computing machine that she
wrote down on a piece of paper because no computers existed at the time! Programming languages have
obviously come a long way since then but in order to understand the history of programming languages,
one must first acknowledge their origin.

History of programming languages: A timeline

Listed below is a timeline of the history of programming languages. The first known programming languages
were complicated machine codes that were manually inputted into early computing machines. As you’ll
discover, computer programming developed quickly from
machine codes to fully automated human-readable code.

1843: Ada Lovelace’s machine algorithm

Ada Lovelace invents the first-ever machine algorithm for
Charles Babbage’s Difference Machine that lays the foundation
for all programming languages.

Figure 1. Ada Lovelace inventor of the

first-ever machine algorithm

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1944-1945: Plankalkül
Somewhere between 1944-1945, Konrad Zuse developed the
first ‘real’ programming language called Plankalkül (Plan
Calculus). Zeus’s language (among other things) allowed for
the creations of procedures, which stored chunks of code
that could be invoked over and over to perform routine
operations.

Figure 2. Konrad Zuse developed the

first ‘real’ programming language.
1949: Assembly Language
Assembly language was used in the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC). Assembly
language was a type of low-level programming language that simplified the language of machine code. In
other words, the specific instructions necessary to operate a computer.

1949: Shortcode
Shortcode (or Short-order code), was the first High-Level Language (HLL) suggested by John McCauley in
1949. However, it was William Schmitt who implemented it for the BINAC computer the same year and for
the UNIVAC in 1950.

1952: Autocode
Autocode was a general term used for a family of programming languages. First developed by Alick Glennie
for the Mark 1 computer at the University of Manchester, Autocode was the first-ever compiled language
to be implemented meaning that it can be translated directly into machine code using a program called a
compiler. Autocode was used on the Ferranti Pegasus and Sirius early computing machines in addition to
the Mark 1.

1957: FORTRAN
FORmula TRANslation or FORTRAN was created by John Backus and is considered to be the oldest
programming language in use today. The programming language was created for high-level scientific,
mathematical, and statistical computations. FORTRAN is still in use today in some of the world’s most
advanced supercomputers.
Figure 3. FORmula TRANslation (FORTRAN)

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1958: ALGOL (Algorithmic Language)

Algorithmic language or ALGOL was created by a joint committee of American and European computer
scientists. ALGOL served as the starting point for the development of some of the most important
programming languages including Pascal, C, C++, and Java.

1958: LISP (List Processor)

List processor or LISP was invented by John McCarthy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Originally purposed for artificial intelligence, LISP is one of the oldest programming languages still in use
today and can be used in the place of Ruby or Python. Companies such as Acceleration, Boeing, and
Genworks are still using LISP in their tech stacks.

1959: COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language)

Common Business Oriented Language (COBOL), is the programming language behind many credit card
processors, ATMs, telephone and cell calls, hospital signals, and traffic signals systems (just to name a
few). The development of the language was led by Dr. Grace Murray Hopper and was designed so that it
could run on all brands and types of computers. COBOL is still used to this day primarily for banking
systems.

1964: BASIC (Beginner’s All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code)

Beginners All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code or BASIC was developed by a group of students at
Dartmouth College. The language was written for students who did not have a strong understanding of
mathematics or computers. The language was developed further by Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul
Allen and became the first marketable product of the company.

1970: PASCAL
Named after the French mathematician Blaise Pascal, Niklaus Wirth developed the programming language
in his honor. It was developed as a learning tool for computer programming which meant it was easy to
learn. It was favored by Apple in the company’s early days, because of its ease of use and power.

1972: Smalltalk
Developed at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre by Alan Kay, Adele Goldberg, and Dan Ingalls, Smalltalk
allowed for computer programmers to modify code on the fly. It introduced a variety of programming
language aspects that are visible languages of today such as Python, Java, and Ruby. Companies such as
Leafly, Logitech, and CrowdStrike state they use Smalltalk in their tech stacks.

1972: C
Developed by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system. It
was called C because it was based on an earlier language called ‘B’. Many of the current leading languages
are derivatives of C including; C#, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, and Python. It also has been used by huge
companies like Google, Facebook, and Apple.

1972: SQL (SEQUEL at the time)

SQL was first developed by IBM researchers Raymond Boyce and Donald Chamberlain. SEQUEL (as it was
referred to at the time), is used for viewing and changing information that is stored in databases. Nowadays
the language is an acronym – SQL, which stands for Structured Query Language. There is a plethora of
companies that use SQL and some of them include Microsoft and Accenture.
1980-1981: Ada
Ada was originally designed by a team led by Jean Ichbiah of CUU Honeywell Bull under contract to the
United States Department of Defense. Named after the mid-19th-century mathematician Ada Lovelace,

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Ada is a structured, statically typed, imperative, wide-spectrum, and object-oriented high-level

programming language. Ada was extended from other popular programming languages at the time such as
Pascal. Ada is used for air-traffic management systems in countries such as Australia, Belgium, and
Germany as well as a host of other transport and space projects.

1983: C++
Bjarne Stroustrup modified the C language at the Bell Labs, C++ is an extension of C with enhancements
such as classes, virtual functions, and templates. It has been listed in the top 10 programming
languages since 1986 and received Hall of Fame status in 2003. C++ is used in MS Office, Adobe Photoshop,
game engines, and other high-performance software.

1983: Objective-C
Developed by Brad Cox and Tom Love, Objective-C is the main programming language used to write
software for macOS and iOS, Apple’s operating systems.

1987: Perl
Perl was created by Larry Wall and is a general-purpose, high-level programming language. It was originally
designed as a scripting language designed for text editing but nowadays it’s widely used for many purposes
such as CGI, database applications, system administration, network programming, and graphic
programming.

1990: Haskell
Haskell is a general-purpose programming language named after the American logician and mathematician
Haskell Brooks Curry. It is a purely functional programming language meaning it’s primarily mathematical.
It’s used across multiple industries particularly those that deal with complicated calculations, records, and
number-crunching. Like many other programming languages from this era, it is not overly common to see
Haskell in use for well-known applications. With that said, the programming language has been used to
write a number of games one of which is Nikki and the Robots.

1991: Python
Named after the British comedy troupe ‘Monty Python’, Python was developed by Guido Van Rossum. It is
a general-purpose, high-level programming language created to support a variety of programming styles
and be fun to use (a number of the tutorials, samples, and instructions often contain Monty Python
references). Python is, to this day, one of the most popular programming languages in the world is used
by companies such as Google, yahoo, and Spotify.

1991: Visual Basic

Developed by Microsoft, Visual Basic allows programmers to utilize a drag-and-drop style of choosing and
changing pre-selected chunks of code through a graphical user interface (GUI). The language is not overly
used these days however Microsoft has used portions Visual Basic to a number of their applications like
Word, Excel, and Access.

1993: Ruby
Created by Yukihiro Matsumoto, Ruby is an interpreted high-level programming language. A teaching
language which was influenced by Perl, Ada, Lisp, and Smalltalk – among others. Ruby’s primary uses are
for web applications development and Ruby on Rails. Twitter, Hulu, and Groupon are some well-known
examples of companies that use Ruby.

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1995: Java
Java is a general-purpose, high-level language created by James Gosling for an interactive TV project. It
has cross-platform functionality and is consistently among the top of the world’s most popular
programming languages. Java can be found everywhere, from computers to smartphones to parking
meters.

1995: PHP
Formerly known as ‘Personal Home Page’ which now stands for ‘Hypertext Preprocessor’, PHP was
developed by Rasmus Lerdorf. Its primary uses include building and maintaining dynamic web pages, as
well as server-side development. Some of the biggest companies from across the globe use PHP including
Facebook, Wikipedia, Digg, WordPress, and Joomla.

1995: JavaScript
JavaScript was created by Brendan Eich, this language is primarily used for dynamic web development,
PDF documents, web browsers, and desktop widgets. Almost every major website uses JavaScript. Gmail,
Adobe Photoshop, and Mozilla Firefox include some well-known examples.

2000: C#
Developed at Microsoft with the hope of combining the computing ability of C++ with the simplicity of
Visual Basic, C# is based on C++ and shares many similarities with Java. The language is used in almost all
Microsoft products and is seen primarily in developing desktop applications.

2003: Scala
Developed by Martin Odersky, Scala which combines mathematical functional programming and organized
object-oriented programming. Scala’s compatibility with Java makes it helpful with Android development.
LinkedIn, Twitter, Foursquare, and Netflix are just a few examples of the many companies that use Scala
in their tech stacks.

2003: Groovy
Derived from Java, Groovy was developed by James Strachan and Bob McWhirter. The language improves
productivity because of its succinct and easy to learn. Some well-known companies that are using Groovy
in their tech stacks are Starbucks, Transferwise, and Craftbase.

2009: Go
Go was developed by Google to address issues that occur due to large software systems. Due to
its simple and modern structure, Go has gained popularity among some of the largest tech companies
around the world such as Google, Uber, Twitch, and Dropbox.

2014: Swift
Developed by Apple as a replacement for C, C++, and Objective-C, Swift was developed with the intention
to be easier than the aforementioned languages and allow less room for error. Swift’s versatility means it
can be used for desktop, mobile, and cloud applications. Leading language app ‘Duolingo’ launched a new
app that was written in Swift.

2015: Rust
Graydon Hoare started development of the Rust programming language around 2010. After contributions
from hundreds of people, it was officially released as version 1.0.0 alpha by Mozilla research on January
9, 2015.

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What old programming languages are still used today?

Not all programming languages last forever. Whether it’s a result of developments in technology or simply
being replaced by a more sophisticated language. With that said, there are some older programming
languages still being used by IT professionals today:

FORTRAN
The initial version of FORTRAN was proposed at IBM by John Backus way back in 1953. It was the first
optimizer compiler and was widely used for scientific work because it’s optimized code competed
favorably with hand-written assembly code. The language is still used to this day on some of the world’s
fastest supercomputers. There has been a string of updates since 1953 with the most recent version
released in 2018.
COBOL
COBOL was developed back in 1959 and was one of the first high-level programming languages. Despite
being invented so long-ago COBOL is still hugely prevalent today. In the US alone, 43% of banking systems
are built on COBOL, accounting for 95% of ATM swipes, and 80% of in-person transactions.

Early Microsoft and Apple Programming Languages

Microsoft and Apple are two of the most fundamental companies in the history of programming
languages. BASIC (first released in 1964), was modified by Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen in
1975. Their modified version became Altair BASIC, which was the first marketed and distributed product
of Microsoft, and led to the creation of the company.

Pascal was the programming language of choice during the early days of Apple. Invented in the early 1970s,
Apple developers liked Pascal because of its power and ease of use. However, when Apple acquired the
NeXTSTEP code library in 1996, Objective-C (which was licensed under NeXTSTEP) became the popular
language of choice for the tech giant.

What is the most popular programming language today?

We’re nearing the end of our journey through the history of programming languages. As you’ve seen,
computer programming has developed to a level beyond all expectation, powering the technology that we
rely on a daily basis. It’s for this reason that we need skilled professionals to implement and control the
programming languages that power the world today.

But which programming language is the most popular?

Sep Sep
2022 2021 Change Programming Language Ratings Change

1 2 Python 15.74% +4.07%

2 1 C 13.96% +2.13%

3 3 Java 11.72% +0.60%

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Sep Sep
2022 2021 Change Programming Language Ratings Change

4 4 C++ 9.76% +2.63%

5 5 C# 4.88% -0.89%

6 6 Visual Basic 4.39% -0.22%

7 7 JavaScript 2.82% +0.27%

8 8 Assembly language 2.49% +0.07%

9 10 SQL 2.01% +0.21%

10 9 PHP 1.68% -0.17%

Figure 4. The top 10 Languages the most companies are looking for technical skills in
Programming

Conclusion
The history of programming languages is fascinating. Who would have thought that an algorithm from the
mid-19th century would pave the way for the technology-driven society we live in today? From early
machine codes to the sophisticated human-readable code that powers our favorite technologies today,
programming languages have come a long way. What’s for certain, computer programming will continue
to develop as it has done for the past 150 years and it’s exciting to see what the future brings.

Introduction of Programming Paradigms

Paradigm can also be termed as method to solve some problem or do some task. Programming paradigm
is an approach to solve problem using some programming language or also we can say it is a method to
solve a problem using tools and techniques that are available to us following some approach. There are
lots for programming language that are known but all of them need to follow some strategy when they are
implemented and this methodology/strategy is paradigms. Apart from varieties of programming language
there are lots of paradigms to fulfil each and every demand. They are discussed below:

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 Imperative programming paradigm:

It is one of the oldest programming paradigm. It features close relation to machine architecture.
It is based on Von Neumann architecture. It works by changing the program state through
assignment statements. It performs step by step task by changing state. The main focus is on how
to achieve the goal. The paradigm consists of several statements and after execution of all the
result is stored.

Advantage: Disadvantage:
1. Very simple to implement 1. Complex problem cannot be solved
2. It contains loops, variables etc. 2. Less efficient and less productive
3. Parallel programming is not possible

Examples of Imperative programming paradigm:

C: Developed by Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson
Fortan: Developed by John Backus for IBM
Basic: Developed by John G Kemeny and Thomas E Kurtz

Imperative programming is divided into three broad categories: Procedural, OOP and parallel processing.
These paradigms are as follows:
1. Procedural programming paradigm –
This paradigm emphasizes on procedure in terms of under lying machine model. There is no
difference in between procedural and imperative approach. It has the ability to reuse the code
and it was boon at that time when it was in use because of its reusability.

Examples of Procedural programming paradigm:

C: developed by Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson
C++: developed by Bjarne Stroustrup
Java: developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems
ColdFusion: developed by J J Allaire
Pascal: developed by Niklaus Wirth

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Then comes OOP

2. Object oriented programming –

The program is written as a collection of classes and object which are meant for communication.
The smallest and basic entity is object and all kind of computation is performed on the objects
only. More emphasis is on data rather procedure. It can handle almost all kind of real life
problems which are today in scenario.

Advantages:
1. Data security
2. Inheritance
3. Code reusability
4. Flexible and abstraction is also present

Examples of Object Oriented programming paradigm:

Simula: first OOP language
Java: developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems
C++: developed by Bjarne Stroustrup
Objective-C: designed by Brad Cox
Visual Basic .NET: developed by Microsoft
Python: developed by Guido van Rossum
Ruby: developed by Yukihiro Matsumoto
Smalltalk: developed by Alan Kay, Dan Ingalls, Adele Goldberg
3. Parallel processing approach -
Parallel processing is the processing of program instructions by dividing them among multiple
processors. A parallel processing system possess many numbers of processor with the objective of
running a program in less time by dividing them. This approach seems to be like divide and
conquer. Examples are NESL (one of the oldest one) and C/C++ also supports because of some
library function.

 Declarative programming paradigm:

It is divided as Logic, Functional, and Database. In computer science the declarative
programming is a style of building programs that expresses logic of computation without talking
about its control flow. It often considers programs as theories of some logic. It may simplify writing
parallel programs. The focus is on what needs to be done rather how it should be done basically
emphasize on what code is actually doing. It just declares the result we want rather how it has
been produced. This is the only difference between imperative (how to do) and declarative (what
to do) programming paradigms. Getting into deeper we would see logic, functional and database.

1. Logic programming paradigms

It can be termed as abstract model of computation. It would solve logical problems like puzzles,
series etc. In logic programming we have a knowledge base which we know before and along with
the question and knowledge base which is given to machine, it produces result. In normal
programming languages, such concept of knowledge base is not available but while using the
concept of artificial intelligence, machine learning we have some models like Perception model
which is using the same mechanism.

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In logical programming the main emphasize is on knowledge base and the problem. The execution
of the program is very much like proof of mathematical statement, e.g., Prolog.

sum of two number in prolog:

predicates

sumoftwonumber(integer, integer)
clauses

sum(0, 0).
sum(n, r):-
n1=n-1,
sum(n1, r1),
r=r1+n

2. Functional programming paradigms

The functional programming paradigms has its roots in mathematics and it is language independent.
The key principal of this paradigms is the execution of series of mathematical functions. The central
model for the abstraction is the function which are meant for some specific computation and not
the data structure. Data are loosely coupled to functions. The function hides their implementation.
Function can be replaced with their values without changing the meaning of the program. Some of
the languages like Perl, JavaScript mostly uses this paradigm.

Examples of Functional programming paradigm:

JavaScript: developed by Brendan Eich
Haskwell: developed by Lennart Augustsson, Dave Barton
Scala: developed by Martin Odersky
Erlang: developed by Joe Armstrong, Robert Virding
Lisp: developed by John Mccarthy
ML: developed by Robin Milner
Clojure: developed by Rich Hickey

The next kind of approach is the Database.

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3. Database/Data driven programming approach

This programming methodology is based on data and its movement. Program statements are defined
by data rather than hard-coding a series of steps. A database program is the heart of a business
information system and provides file creation, data entry, update, query and reporting functions.
There are several programming languages that are developed mostly for database application. For
example, SQL. It is applied to streams of structured data, for filtering, transforming, aggregating
(such as computing statistics), or calling other programs. So it has its own wide application.

CREATE DATABASE databaseAddress;

CREATE TABLE Addr (
PersonID int,
LastName varchar(200),
FirstName varchar(200),
Address varchar(200),
City varchar(200),
State varchar(200)
);

References:
https://devskiller.com/history-of-programming-languages
https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/introduction-of-programming-paradigms

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