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Hi Yves,
Long ago (in the late neolithic) PostScript was my specialty, and it is a most interesting language in that it is much more like LISP, or SmallTalk, than other popular languages (like Pascal) when it was introduced as a page-description language interpreter inside laser-printers. Few realized it was, indeed, a full-Turing-equivalent computer language, and fewer actually programmed in it.
I wrote most of the book "Real-World PostScript" (Addison-Wesley, 1986), and ended up working at Adobe and writing the PostScript code that did color separation for Illustrator 5, as well as being on the team that created Acrobat for which I designed the first file format (very much like HTML, but my design was not used in the released product).
PostScript:
0. interpreted
1. integrally "bound" to a powerful vector graphic engine, that "embodies" a 2D object-oriented drawing-model for lines, shapes, and fonts/text, which took about a decade to be matched in functionality by Apple and Win OS's.
2. recursion, text-to-cdoe and code-to-text: it is trivial to modify/compose programs on-the-fly, and to turn text to executable, and executable to text. recursion easy to perform.
3. the RPN stack model is used in many ways, including managing semantic name-space look-up by a stack of Dictionaries.
4. made available polymorphic mapping operators (collection iterators) long before these became available to the public in other languages.
“I have diligently numbered the days of pure and genuine happiness which have fallen to my lot: They amount to 14.” Abd-Ar Rahman III, Caliph of Cordoba, circa 950CE.
modified 13-Aug-14 7:20am.
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Hi Bill,
It's nice to hear that I'm not the only PostScript expert/dinosaur left  I'm sure I read your book back in the day.
Low-level manipulation of PostScript and PDF is still a regular part of many of my projects. At my last job I had to write a RIP from scratch, because the vendor's (Roland) RIP, built for sign shops could not handle the complexity of the thousands of little labels that we were trying to output. You really appreciate 64-bit operating systems and gobs of memory when rasterizing 40"x80" CMmYyK documents at 300-600dpi.
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Hi Yves,
If you can write a PostScript RIP, I salute you as the ancient Roman gladiators once saluted the Emperor:
"Morituri te salutamas"
yours, Bill
“I have diligently numbered the days of pure and genuine happiness which have fallen to my lot: They amount to 14.” Abd-Ar Rahman III, Caliph of Cordoba, circa 950CE.
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yea! As it should be
dev
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I've used most of the listed languages at some point for one thing or another. I don't really have a favorite language. My primary languages are C++ and C# but I use others when needed.
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I started out loving Assembly the best. Then I took an assembly program it took me months to write and tweak for speed with all the fanciest tricks and coded it in C in two hours. It was only 5% slower. I loved being right at the processor level but that was the end of Assembly. Many years later I took a C program it took me months to write and coded it C# in one day. I loved being so close to the hardware but that was the end of C.
So many details! (heavy sigh) So much confusion...
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I've followed the same path.
I always liked that C allowed use of inline assembly.
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It took me a while to accept that .NET didn't even compile to actual machine language but to an intermediate language that finishes compiling at runtime.
So many details! (heavy sigh) So much confusion...
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I started with GW-BASIC, then learned x86 assembler. Pascal was the next, then Java, JavaScript, Fortran, C, C++, C#, Python, CUDA, OpenCL. I used Mathematica (AKA Wolfram language) in my theses, and really enjoyed it for years and to the date. Never used Visual Basic in plain, but used VBA for small jobs inside MS Word/Excel only.
I have done serious programming in all of the above languages, but it depends on the condition. It heavily depends on the condition.
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I had the most fun with "C", so it's my favorite.
I rarely get to use it anymore. The closest thing is the similar naming of so many function in .php. Reminders of golden days (and possibly why I've taken a liking to php).
We Didn't Need No Stinkin' Classes !
| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error." - Weisert | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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Every time I have to use the native Win32 I thank goodness for classes. MFC (or OWL) can't compare to Windows Forms, but it sure made life easier.
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My answer was BASIC. And now, my reasoning.
Working for the most part with engineers or other individuals who do not come from a trained developer background, we use that which is most easily used by all. In this case, VBA, VBScript or VB.NET. For what we do, it suffices... we don't write time critical applications; we process data and parse the results after the fact.
Having said that... I thought it humorous that C, C++, C# and Objective C were all singled out, but BASIC (and all its variants for the past 50 years) were lumped into a single category.
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I guess they don't make engineers and such like they used to.
In my day (by cracky) we all knew FORTRAN and many of us Assembly of some sort or another.
| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error." - Weisert | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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Like most things there are different breeds of engineer, the ones I worked with in manufacturing in the 90s had almost no programming skills!
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity
RAH
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Tim Carmichael wrote: I thought it humorous that C, C++, C# and Objective C were all singled out,
Well...they are all different languages, which share a common syntax base.
C is a subset of C++, I'll grant you: but C# is a very different beastie from C++ and if you try to treat the one like the other it'll end in tears...
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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Yes, different languages, common base. Commodore BASIC, VAX BASIC, GW-BASIC, VBA, VBScript, VB.NET... all different languages, one common base.
However, for the survey, they are all lumped together, unlike the C derivatives.
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The answer is obviously BASIC right? 
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Beginners' Assinine Simplified Introduction to C?
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PIEBALDconsult wrote: Beginners' Assinine Simplified Introduction to C?
Either that or:
Best Assembled Solution In Code!
I can't remember which. 
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Let me jog your memory to help you remember:
<small><br />
PIEBALDconsult wrote:</small><br />
Beginners' Assinine Simplified Introduction to C?<br />
| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error." - Weisert | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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C/C++ is the only way to go, if you really want to program! (I like other languages, but I still use C/C++) 
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No Visual Basic? 
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It's lumped in with the other variants, like all the C++ versions are together.
You looking for sympathy?
You'll find it in the dictionary, between sympathomimetic and sympatric
(Page 1788, if it helps)
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LazyTarget wrote: No Visual Basic?
Is that a wish ?
| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error." - Weisert | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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