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.
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