9 programming languages

ALGOL, ADA, PASCAL or LOGO are all programming languages over 30 years old but still have practical value.

List of 'old but not old' programming languages

The final programming languages may be outdated but rarely eradicated. Although the heyday is over, they are still living in a mess because it is more suitable for the niche market than any other fashionable alternative. With programmers working with old programs, nurturing 'monsters' is a better choice than having to rewrite everything. Here are 9 programming languages that have been around for a long time but are still used today:

1. ALGOL (1958)

ALGOL stands for ' Algorithmic Language' (Algorit algorithm), invented by a group of European and American computer scientists.

The peak period : 1958 - 1968

Main use purpose : Mainly scientific calculation. ALGOL is the first attempt at writing a language that can surpass its foundation and be used on many different machines. It is more suitable for experimental environments than commercial products because there is no input-output protocol at all.

Today, ALGOL is used very little but its DNA is present in many popular languages.

Picture 1 of 9 programming languages
Illustration

2. COBOL (1959)

COBOL stands for ' Common Business-Oriented Language ', due to a large council consisting of pioneer computer scientist Grace Hopper, who invented the term 'bug' (bug). ), Birth.

The peak period: from the 1960s to the 1980s

Main uses: Large systems such as accounting, books, insurance.

Currently, it is still taught at schools through heritage in large businesses and government. In 2000, large financial institutions were forced to call back COBOL programmers to dig up old code and rewrite around the Y2K incident. A few years later, Computerworld magazine reported that these young language savvy developers received very high salaries, while others were advised to learn it to maintain the old code.

3. PL / I (1964)

PL / I stands for ' Programming Language One ', invented by an assembly of IBM.

The peak period : the early 1970s

Main uses: The common language for IBM System / 360, deployed in all operations from accounting books to astrophysics. PL / I was born with the additional goal of COBOL, FORTRAN and other languages, more widely used in the Soviet Union than in the West.

PL / I is judged to be too troublesome, resource-consuming and users are stuck in IBM's proprietary products. However, due to the dominance of IBM in the past, many PL / I programs are still present and newly updated a few weeks ago to be compatible with newer Web code.

4. PASCAL (1968)

Short for ' Mathemmatician Blaise Pascal ', founded by Niklaus Wirth.

The peak period: the 1980s

Main uses : Considered the most famous 'descendant' of ALGOL, PASCAL is used primarily for teaching and developing software in Apple's first computers. 1983 Turbo Pascal version is also very popular.

Today, this language is still used when teaching programming but not as often as 30 years ago.

5. LISP (1958)

LISP stands for 'List Processing ', invented by John McCarthy.

The peak period : the 1960s

Main uses : artificial intelligence, air defense, computer gambling

Today, LISP is still one of the dominant languages in artificial intelligence works.

6. APL (1962)

The abbreviation of ' A Programming Language ', invented by Ken Iverson.

The peak period : the 1960s

Main uses: mainly applied mathematics. Famous for its simplicity and clear syntax. The bad thing is that it needs Greek characters, obscure symbols, special keyboards. Read from right to left.

Currently, APL is no longer widely used but still appears in some niche markets such as DNA verification, accounting theory.

7. FORTRAN (1957)

The abbreviation of ' Formula Translator ', invented by John Backus for IBM.

Peak period : the 1960s and 1970s

Main purpose : The first high-level language that allows writing code in English and then is translated through a compiler to create a version that the computer can run quickly. Used primarily for heavy-duty scientific tasks.

Currently, FORTRAN is still widely used by physicists and engineers.

8. LOGO (1967)

The abbreviation of ' logos ' in Greek, meaning 'word' or 'thought', was invented by Seymour Papert, Wally Feurzeig and a group at MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.

Peak period : 1970s and 1980s

Main uses: LOGO is developed to teach young children how to program. It shows the cursor named 'turtle', responding to commands on the screen. Today, it is still widely used.