A comment on programming languages

[chipotle]

On Slashdot, someone wrote, "I would feel pretty stupid actually reading a QBASIC book in 2003. Modern programming languages are easier to learn than QBASIC." To which the reply was:

By what reckoning? They turn this:

PRINT A +  B

into this:

am = new math.ArithmeticManager();
opA = new math.Operand((float) a);
opB = new math.Operand((float) b);
am.addOperand(opA);
am.addOperand(opB);
am.operator = new math.operators.Addition();
am.executeMathOperation();
system.io.output.print(am.mathOperationResult());

You know, he has a point.

Comments

[mcgroarty.livejournal.com]

You should see what comes out of the current crop of CS graduates, who haven't touched anything but overtemplated Visual C++ and MFC all their lives. :( :( :(

[bwcoyoten.livejournal.com]

That looks like Ada...

AGH! Military Flashback! Military Flashback!!!

The thing with "modern" programming languages (as opposed to what, pleistocene programming languages?) is that there's a definite power/readability trade-off. Generally speaking, the more powerful a programming language is, the lower level it is, and therefore the harder it is to read or learn. VC++ runs way faster than VB, which is loads easier to write in.

This being my semi-ex-professional opinion.