Well my answer for one is no I don't think of HTML as a programming language cuz it's not written for a computer to read but rather a program already running on a computer to read, and then when I went to answer question two it occured to me that I could say the same thing about BASIC (or any other interpretted language), so I'd have to revise my opinion a bit. My complex answer would be that technically HTML is a programming language, but I'm reluctant to admit it and it would be a long time before I would come up with it as a candidate for a list of programming languages cuz my fetch all things in a category algorithm works differently than my look at a thing and decide which category it belongs in algorithm does.
It's a little more than "a data format", despite not being a programming language. I guess, if I were pinned down on the matter, I'd have to describe it as ... a "markup language"? ;-)
Similarly, there have been other languages, for printing markup, described as "page description languages". So if someone calls it a "computer language", I have to cringe and say, "Okay, sort of," because it's a languag meant to be processed by a computer, but since it doesn't do anything (it only describes), it's not a programming language.
Now I'm wondering whether some of the people who refer to HTML as a programming language merely fail to distinguish between programming languages and anything else with a syntax that has to do with computers. Hmm. How to phrase a question to test that...
True, Postscript does go way beyond being merely a page description language. Variables, branches, loops, it's a programming language that just happens to have been designed for layout, not a mere markup language.
*nod* I agree, but I put that question in there because I saw more than one person list HTML as their first programming language in the survey I linked to, and wondered how widespread that attitude is.
I bet that among people who know HTML and zero programming languages, HTML may count more often.
I also bet that among people who learned HTML before learning a programming language, there is a high incidence of JavaScript being the first programming language, but that this set of people may not make too much of that distinction.
Re: Cute Keith :-)
Re: Cute Keith :-)
Re: Cute Keith :-)
Similarly, there have been other languages, for printing markup, described as "page description languages". So if someone calls it a "computer language", I have to cringe and say, "Okay, sort of," because it's a languag meant to be processed by a computer, but since it doesn't do anything (it only describes), it's not a programming language.
Now I'm wondering whether some of the people who refer to HTML as a programming language merely fail to distinguish between programming languages and anything else with a syntax that has to do with computers. Hmm. How to phrase a question to test that...
Re: Cute Keith :-)
PostScript is a full-blown programming language, though I'm not crazy enough to actually try to program in it.
Re: Cute Keith :-)
And then there's TeX
Re: Cute Keith :-)
Re: Cute Keith :-)
Re: Cute Keith :-)
I bet that among people who know HTML and zero programming languages, HTML may count more often.
I also bet that among people who learned HTML before learning a programming language, there is a high incidence of JavaScript being the first programming language, but that this set of people may not make too much of that distinction.