Programming

17364 readers

179 users here now

Welcome to the main community in programming.dev! Feel free to post anything relating to programming here!

Cross posting is strongly encouraged in the instance. If you feel your post or another person's post makes sense in another community cross post into it.

Hope you enjoy the instance!

Rules

Follow the programming.dev instance rules
Keep content related to programming in some way
If you're posting long videos try to add in some form of tldr for those who don't want to watch videos

Wormhole

Follow the wormhole through a path of communities !webdev@programming.dev

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

snowe@programming.dev

Ategon@programming.dev

MaungaHikoi@lemmy.nz

173

Why do they keep making new languages (lemmy.stonansh.org)

submitted 1 year ago by lemmy@lemmy.stonansh.org to c/programming@programming.dev

121 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Why are there so many programming languages? And why are there still being so many made? I would think you would try to perfect what you have instead of making new ones all the time. I understand you need new languages sometimes like quantumcomputing or some newer tech like that. But for pc you would think there would be some kind of universal language. I'm learning java btw. I like programming languages. But was just wondering.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] redcalcium@lemmy.institute 198 points 1 year ago (5 children)

you would think there would be some kind of universal language

[–] Kerensky1101@lemmy.world 23 points 1 year ago

There is an xkcd for everything

[–] Mic_Check_One_Two@reddthat.com 21 points 1 year ago

You got to it before I did. Programming languages are like vehicles. You wouldn’t take a sports car off-roading, and you wouldn’t expect a tractor to win a drag race. There is a lot you can do with an all-purpose vehicle, but it’s not going to be as good as something that is purpose-built for a single task.

[–] Zalack@startrek.website 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I actually don't think that's the case for languages. Most languages start out from a desire to do some specific thing better than other languages rather than do everything.

[–] lysdexic@programming.dev 4 points 1 year ago

If there was a single language, afterwards the same broken logic would be applied to frameworks and libraries, and we all know how many people bitch and whine over Java and it's extensive standard library.

[–] jeffhykin@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

JavaScript (is the universal language) (is also the answer of why there are so many languages)