What programming languages you know and why ?

[Sarevok]

I think it would be interesting to know not just what languages you know but why you learned it and ultimately how useful that knowledge was to you.

Here is the 3 languages I know =>

Java = The small company I am part of makes apps for J2Me phones (aka most feature phones). I had to learn Java to do this job and did not expect to become a fan. However Javas forgiving nature and its ubiquitous presence in various places like internet applets and Android phones combined to make it my present favorite.

C/C++ = My once favorite language. I got into programming as a kid with a desire to learn this. Not really a fan anymore due to amount of time and effort needed to work on projects involving C/C++. It proved a hideous choice for simple desktop apps. But I think still has no substitute for things like 3D graphics in games.

PHP = Ugh ! Dont like it but was forced to learn to support backends for some of the aforementioned J2Me apps. Love it, hate I got to live with PHP these days.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

I know C++, because most everything I do revolves around it one way or another. I also prefer it for its power and flexibility.

I know C#, because it's becoming fairly important in the game industry. I originally learned it as part of a required course and have since brushed up on it because of its use in Xbox 360 development and the XNA API.

And right now I'm learning assembly. Not particularly useful in practical terms, but it is neat to see just how higher-level functions are implemented by the computer. Knowing how registers and memory works on a deeper level is also a plus.

[Starglider]

Digital Mars D - greatest language ever made, I use it for virtually everything now, personally and professionally.

Really? What compiler are you using? I like the language design but the total lack of 64-bit support makes the official compiler completely useless for me, and I never got the LLVM based compile path to work.

Ruby - Its a steaming pile of horseshit and I hate its guts with a burning passion of rage.

That's interesting, I haven't used it but you are literally the first person I've seen to say they hate it.

[Channel72]

Digital Mars D - greatest language ever made, I use it for virtually everything now, personally and professionally.

The problem with D is that it's basically a "toy" at this point. Yeah, it's a fantastic language. D is essentially C++ with a much better standard library, much saner meta-programming facilities, and no legacy baggage associated with backwards compatibility with C. But D is extremely difficult to actually use professionally. Firstly, very few programmers know D, and so most software companies aren't going to risk using it for any serious projects. Secondly, it's not backed by an actual ISO-standard the way C++ is, or a gigantic corporation the way C# or Java is, so who knows how stable D really is as a language? Also, the tools/support/third-party libraries for it are barely existent compared to established languages like C++.

It's sad, really, because it's a great language. But until it gains some serious momentum in the industry, it's unlikely most people will be able to use it for anything other than their own personal projects.

[Dave]

C++ -- I'm currently taking a CS class on data structures. Who made an AVL tree with iterators? This guy. Man, that was hard.
C# -- I'm TAing the basic and advanced courses in this.
Python -- did some messing around in this in an AI tournament last semester, and I have a game project in python on the backburner.

I'm taking a course in Java next semester, after which I graduate college.

And I've dabbled in perl and bash, but that isn't really saying much.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Java - I learned it last year in CS Engineering.
I used to know a bit of HTML, but i'd need to sit on it for a few weeks to remember anything about it.

[General Zod]

BASIC still counts as a programming language right?

[Dave]

Does SQL count as a programing language? How about TI-BASIC?

[Marcus Aurelius]

And I've dabbled in perl and bash, but that isn't really saying much.

Bash is another language from hell. It's pretty good for one liners (to be expected, being a command line interpreter) but after that, oh god what a mess.

And that's just the beginning of the evil there. My god.

Then again, nobody actually writes anything bigger than short shell scripts with bash. I also think that some of the quirkiness comes from the fact that it was designed as a drop-in replacement for sh (Bourne shell), which brings us right back to the 1970s.

[Ryan Thunder]

Turing - First thing I was taught in high school.

TurboPascal - idiotic 12th grade computer science teacher thought Turing was "babying [us]" but couldn't be fucked to learn a non-antiquated language.

Java - used it for school.

C# - learned it on my own, now I use it for work.

JavaScript - learned it for work; hate it.

SQL - learned it for work.

[Chris OFarrell]

Its sad really, I used to do quite a bit of C, C++/C#, Java, PHP, various scripting languages and so on, but its slowly atrophied over time as I just don't do that much programing in my current job.

I'm sure I could pick one up again very quickly, but its slightly annoying given how much effort I put into learning them in the first place.

[Darkevilme]

C++: My current main language. I have a big ambitious project using irrlicht in this language which is on hold till i get a break in my studies. Strangely haven't used it for any of the games i've made as class assignments but for projects of my own volution i default to C++.

C#: We were given an assignment to make an XNA game which introduced me to this language. I haven't used it since making that game except to do a bit of leftover bughunting in said game though. I liked it, though i feel more comfortable with C++ due to weight of experience.

an aside:
A Friend of mine keeps poking me to take up using Java (he doesn't like C++, says it's too hard to master C++ and me using Java would allow us to collaborate more on coding.) What's the general opinion of the forum on Java?

[Hawkwings]

I've learned BASIC on my own. And I use MATLAB for school, being an engineer. I've always wanted to learn more, but never had the time or class scheduling to allow me to.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

What's the general opinion of the forum on Java?

I dislike it. C# is the same idea but implemented better and easier to use. After learning C++, fooling around in Java was unpleasant.

[atg]

Visual Basic.net - I know pros will prob say it sucks balls but programming is only a hobby for me at this stage, with a bit of vbscript being as close as my job gets to programming. Keep planning to learn C++ or C# but life's been getting in the way.

[adam_grif]

I'm hesitant to say I "know" languages. I do assignments in them fine, but I never feel like I actually have a solid understanding of them. I guess I'll find out in a few years when I actually get a job in the field

Anyway, the languages I can use are:

- Java (First year CompSci used it exclusively)
- ActionScript (I took some game dev units on the side for shits and giggles, the early units used AS3)
- C (Algorithms unit, I hate C so much)
- Prolog (for A.I.. This language is so goddamn ass backwards).

Next semester I'll be doing JavaScript for a webdev unit.

[Coalition]

JCL - used to organize the main programs we use

COBOL - still used for financial programs

[Pu-239]

I'm a graduate research assistant working for our computer engineering department, mostly doing work in embedded crypto.

VHDL - the main thing I work in, currently mostly FPGA designs for SHA-3 hash candidates in my duties as a graduate research assistant. A tad verbose, and the tools are stupid and don't understand all language features, but fun to work in. Not really a programming language, really a hardware description language. The very very strict typing is very annoying at times, for example std_logic_vector(0 downto 0) is not the same as std_logic. I need to learn Verilog which does the same thing, but modeled after C and less anal about types (but missing useful features).

PHP- I hate this- I hate languages that require variables to be marked with special characters. OOP support seems mostly like an afterthought, and the standard library doesn't really work that way. I much prefer python, but my professor chose plain PHP, no frameworks, so that my project could be recycled into his existing one. Perl can also die in a fire.

Javascript- Okay to good if libraries such as JQuery or Dojo (I prefer the former) are added to abstract annoying cross-browser differences. I don't even know the standard W3C DOM way of doing things and I don't care to know anymore.

C - I like this, very simple, gets to the point, especially when your work is embedded hardware and you are resource constrained. I don't really know C++ (well, all the keywords) , too complicated and too many language features. If I need something higher level, I go Java, or some scripting language.

NesC - C-based language for TinyOS, which is a pseudoOS that runs on mote microcontrollers. Somewhat annoying due to tons of callbacks, but the C equivalent doing the same thing would probably be worse.

Various flavors of assembly - Doesn't really provide much more benefit than C, although the only way to do things when you have a custom instruction set and no compiler, or very limited ROM space.

Python - my favorite high level language, possibly favorite language period. Used when I just want to compute, generate, or automate something. Very nice when used w/ Django for web stuff, although I haven't had the opportunity to do that lately. The enforced indentation enforces consistency. The bad points is binary incompatibility between point releases of python modules w/ C in them.

Java- I hate this. Way too verbose, use in web applications is way too complicated and overengineered. Used it for work doing a large J2EE app before I left and did grad school fulltime. It's the new COBOL. Fortunately if I ever get my hands on my desired hardware engineering job, I can forget this exists.

PL/SQL - I hate this crap from Oracle, resembles VHDL a bit since they both inherit from ADA. Dabbled a bit for J2EE app mentioned above. Stored procedures are a horrible layering violation.


Matlab- Learned this as an undergrad doing signal transforms for EE classes. Forgot how it works by now. Mildly dislike it (indexes start from 1!) but I suppose it gets the job done. I guess I'll have to relearn it (or learn SciLab instead) to do the data analysis for my projects.

C# - Forgotten by now, basically a slightly improved Java w/ ways to kill yourself and shittier cross-platform support. I stay away.

Bash- Does this really count? Anyway, I use ZSH as my interactive console- it's mostly compatible w/ bash.

Haven't had the joy of doing Haskell, ML, LISP, or any other weird languages

[SCRawl]

I'm an old guy in first-year computer programming. In my past I've used BASIC, a little Linux scripting, and during my university days I learned (and subsequently forgot) FORTRAN and PASCAL. First term programming is using Java, which they're basically using to teach us how to program. There will be some database stuff and C# later on, according to the curriculum.

My plan is to acquire competence in several more languages, but I'll need a good grounding in the basics before that.

[Cecelia5578]

Perl can also die in a fire.

I like Perl, but I your sentiment about the Perl community.

I also admit to a fondness for VB.Net-don't think anyone has mentioned it yet.

[Akkleptos]

LOL

Programming languages?

Back in the 80's and early 90s I used to do a lot of things with BASIC (Commodore 64)
and QBASIC (IBM PC Compatibles)... and I also used to program in... machine language! (for the 6502 processor, in the C64)... Asssemblers? ML "monitors"? Beh! That's for amateurs... I wrote my little programs by POKEing the numbers directly into the memory, via a FOR/NEXT loop and DATA statements, referring to a written list of numeric values for the mnemonics (LDA, LDY, LDX, JMP, RTS, you know) and a pocket calculator for the values.

Late nineties I wrote my web pages directly in HTML, using Notepad.

So, none of that "C++++", "Dolphin" and "PSP" stuff for me (or whatever those things are called)... heh heh.

Ah, those were the days, my friends!

[starslayer]

C++ - took a class in it to learn how to program. We didn't really do much (only got to pointers), but I can do physics in it with some effort.

IDL - this is basically FORTRAN with better graphics support and a standard library with lots of great math/science crap in it. Very useful for processing astronomical images, plotting, etc. However, since it's interpreted, it's slow as hell, and no one uses it for really numerical stuff (that being done in C or straight FORTRAN).

I've pretty much forgotten most of the specifics of both languages from disuse, but it wouldn't take me long to relearn them.

[Wing Commander MAD]

C++: What I learned programmning on, and used throughout my college career. Easily the langauge I'm most comfortable with. I suppose I know a bit of C by extension from this.

C#: Used for XNA, which I need to get back to working on (particularly since XNA 4.0 was released). I'm still learing some of the language specific stuff, though fortunately most of my C++ knowledge is transferable.

High Level Shader Language(HLSL): Something I've learned a bit about in the process of learning XNA stuff, though I'd probably need a quick refresher before doing anything. Definitely interesting and something I'd like to spend some time learning more about.

I'll agree with Destructionator XIII though, once you learn one programming language it's a relatively simple matter to learn others. In fact I'll be so bold as to say that its easier to learn a programming language than it is a natural language.

I still find it odd that Java is used as a introductory language. Learnining proper memory management early and not to rely on garbage collectors is a key skill. I remember back in one of the game dev courses I took having a bit of trouble getting back into the habit of managing my memory allocation on the game console, having come directly from using C# (which is managed) via XNA on Zune/Xbox 360 for a few months previously.

[phongn]

C: University's staff was in love with C (ISO C, not even C99!) and most of the early classes required us to learn it. It's kind of old and not very high-level but it has its uses.

C++: Learned this back in high school, still much prefer it over C. It's hobbled by its backwards-requirements design spec and other bits, but it's getting better and better and its a very powerful language.

Java: Learned in university, my day job has me writing most of our code in Java. Has its warts but it does the job. I think it went a little overboard in "object oriented everything" - and then broke its own philosophy for string concatenation! It's much more natural to go "NUMBER_TYPE + NUMBER_TYPE" rather than "NUMBER_TYPE.add(NUMBERTYPE)"

Javascript: self-taught, use it extensively on the web. It's a pretty powerful language despite the fact its mostly used for DOM manipulation.

C#: Learned in university, my internship at Verizon had me writing a lot of C# code. Reminds me a lot of Java (no surprise there) but with its own weirdness (and the .NET library is not as good as the Java standard one).

Lisp: Learned in a language survey course, fell in love with functional programming even if we only skimmed its great power.

Postscript: Learned in language survey course, don't really do much with it. Probably the most common example of a stack-based programming language.

Prolog: Learned in a language survey course, found it very interesting but didn't have time to delve into it.

PHP: Learned it myself and despise it.

FORTRAN, Pascal, BASIC: Learned these back in high school but haven't really used them much since.

Bits of bash, python, perl, etc. as needed for work purposes.

If you have the slightest lick of competence, you can learn a new language very rapidly, especially for a conservative one like D - your knowledge from C, C++, C#, and Java is all directly applicable. Indeed, you can write full programs just sticking to that knowledge (from any one of those older languages) while learning very little about the new stuff.

Well, to be fair, if you start moving across paradigms things get more difficult. Moving from C to C++ and doing it well is not trivial (just changing the headers and using C-style functions instead of the C++ standard library or STL does not count!). Moving from C to ML or Postscript is another huge conceptual leap that many people fail at.

C++ - Pretty good stuff, but slow as sin. Nevertheless, it's still usually my first choice for complex GUI apps thanks to Qt. But I rarely write those anymore so I rarely use it too. Language wise, D is superior in most ways, so I've no particular desire to go back anyway.

How is C++ slow?

[adam_grif]

I hate C so much

Explain this heresy.

(actually the language has a lot to hate, just wondering what your reasons are)

I'm sure there are good reasons to hate, but I surely don't have any

After 2 years of object oriented programming in Java / AS3 with nice easy ways to do most of the things I needed to do, suddenly I'm tasked with building and traversing graphs in C. That probably seems totally trivial to you older folks, but some of us are lazy and stupid, so that course was pretty hellish for me. Structs, Malloc etc were a pain to get used to.