Submission + - The Rise of Interpreted Languages
neapolitan writes: I do quite a bit of programming in a research / academic environment. When writing routines and algorithms, speed and ease of use in answering the problem at hand are of prime importance. Although C would clearly be faster, almost everything I write is in MATLAB, and despite its quirks (array indices begin with 1) it really gets the job done. Even quite computationally intense projects do not take long on today's machines. I can program in C, but generally don't have to.
Given this experience, it seems to me that as computing power grows, higher and higher languages will become of more importance; nobody will want to write sorting algorithms or use the kludgy C 'string' type workarounds, or routines for drawing graphic object primitives. I'm not saying it's not important to know these things, but just not necessary each time.
What is going to be the ultimate outcome of this? Will high-level programming languages rule as computing power grows? Ultimately I see an oligopoly of high level, platform-independent specifications (standards like openGL, python, perhaps a unified JAVA syntax) that maximizes use of (relatively expensive) programmer time, and also minimizes the importance of the operating system and individual platform in the future. Have others had the same experience?
Given this experience, it seems to me that as computing power grows, higher and higher languages will become of more importance; nobody will want to write sorting algorithms or use the kludgy C 'string' type workarounds, or routines for drawing graphic object primitives. I'm not saying it's not important to know these things, but just not necessary each time.
What is going to be the ultimate outcome of this? Will high-level programming languages rule as computing power grows? Ultimately I see an oligopoly of high level, platform-independent specifications (standards like openGL, python, perhaps a unified JAVA syntax) that maximizes use of (relatively expensive) programmer time, and also minimizes the importance of the operating system and individual platform in the future. Have others had the same experience?