Your Favorite Programming Language

[kikito]

I like javascript. There are some very nice videos from Douglas Crockford that explain it very well. It has lots of similarities with Lua, and I would say that it does some things better than Lua.

I also like lisp. The language is itself a data structure, and that's wicked. But I don't like its syntax, and I don't use it better much.

I like python. Starting with its name. Guido is a very wise individual. I based some parts of middleclass on python's object model. But...

... the warmest place in my heart, for now at least, is for ruby. It's objective was making programmers happy, and, in my case at least, it delivers.

[slime]

Lua. Simple, clean, lightweight. <.<

[vrld]

I am surprised that so few here say Lua. Because Lua is just awesome.
It's fast. It's flexible. It's expressiveness is overwhelming. Embedding Lua in other projects is easy (there is even a binding to embed Lua code in perl). It has first-class functions, allowing for functional programming style. It has tail recursion. It has coroutines, Metatables are awesome. The list goes on.

I really like (Common) Lisp. Learning it is a pain if you already know how to program, because everything is different in Lisp-land. But the reward is worth it. I would like to call Lisp my favorite, but I don't know it well enough yet.

Like giniu, I also like Haskell. First seeing it blew my mind (vigenere cyper in one line? sure thing), although as with Lisp, I don't know it well enough to say it's my favorite.

[TechnoCat]

Java

[giniu]

Java

Java is too old, Java2K is more robust than plain, old, Java - to quote

Java2K is not a deterministic programming language, but a probabilistic one. Even for built-in functions, there is only a certain probability the function will do whatever you intend it to do.

[Taehl]

Lua! It lets me do anything I can dream of, and is even pretty darn fast about it (even without LuaJIT).

If I /really/ need raw power for something, I'll jump to the opposite end of the spectrum and go with L.in.oleum. For the uninitiated, it's an unstructured, untyped, procedural, register-based, CROSS PLATFORM assembly language. It runs about twice as fast as C, on average. It looks something like this (this is a subroutine):

Code: Select all

"calculate velocity"		(find a floating-point velocity from registers a, b, and c)
	[fvel] ,= a; [ftime] ,= b; [faccel] ,= c;
	[fvel] ,* [ftime];
	[ftime] ,* [ftime];
	[ftime] ,* [faccel];
	[ftime] ,/ 2f;
	[fvel] ,+ [ftime];
leave;

[tentus]

PHP + MySQL. Every day I get to find clever new ways to deliver content over the tubes, and the vast majority of my work hinges on those two.

[BlackBulletIV]

Wow, a lot of interesting languages here (some I've never heard of, like Vala) and a lot of posts, lol.

The funny thing is, the line "Readability counts" is included in the The Python Zen.

I think they're probably referring to the forced indentation (which I actually like) and the dynamic typing (every time I have to write "public static void main (String args[])" I throw up a bit in my mouth).

Yeah, you're probably right there. Yeah I know, typing that in Java is a pain. C++ does it better "int main()" or if you want args "int main(int argc, char** argv)". Although I must admit, pointers took quite a while to get the hang of.

On the other hand, static typing is life saver if done right,

I totally agree there. I've had so much trouble with Lua because of the lack of static types. But the one thing I hate about static types, at least in an object model, is that you have to go to sometimes great lengths to remain compliant with the system (like creating multitudes of interfaces and abstract classes). The funny thing is, I still, for the most part, use dynamic typed languages like a static typed language, as my first language was ActionScript (static typed).

But my Python programs are usually more readable than Lua programs. If you're doing it right, Python code will look like poetry, rather than a program listing.

Is that because there's no forced indentation in Lua? For myself I find the programs a more readable in Lua, mainly because of the "end" keyword.

... the warmest place in my heart, for now at least, is for ruby. It's objective was making programmers happy, and, in my case at least, it delivers.

I thought you'd probably say Ruby. That's a plan to check out sometime, I've heard many good things about it. But first there's so many other things to learn, like more advanced C++ and Objective-C.

If I /really/ need raw power for something, I'll jump to the opposite end of the spectrum and go with L.in.oleum. For the uninitiated, it's an unstructured, untyped, procedural, register-based, CROSS PLATFORM assembly language. It runs about twice as fast as C, on average.

Hmmmm, that looks interesting. I've hardly ever seen an assembly language before (I know what they are however). That's a really nice speed.

PHP + MySQL. Every day I get to find clever new ways to deliver content over the tubes, and the vast majority of my work hinges on those two.

That's one I wasn't expecting. A while ago, PHP used to be my favorite language... but I'm a little tired of the inconsistency and procedural style of it. However, for web work, that combination is still what I use.

Can I ask a question about Lua. How does everyone else feel about that lack of bitwise operators, compound operators (this one is driving me nuts), and proper ternary statements (yes I know you can do some tricky stuff "and" and "or", but seriously, that's not great to read).

[nevon]

Can I ask a question about Lua. How does everyone else feel about that lack of bitwise operators, compound operators (this one is driving me nuts), and proper ternary statements (yes I know you can do some tricky stuff "and" and "or", but seriously, that's not great to read).

I miss bitwise and compound operators, but that's just a convenience thing. I really don't think it's that big of a deal. I never use ternary statements in other languages anyway, so I don't miss that much.

[giniu]

That's one I wasn't expecting. A while ago, PHP used to be my favorite language... but I'm a little tired of the inconsistency and procedural style of it. However, for web work, that combination is still what I use.

If you use php for web work, you might want to take a look at that (Haskell ) solution - Snap Framework - it has some interesting performance results - especially it's interesting how Ruby on Rails is outperformed, together with other solutions like LAMP or even Node.js