Issues in programming language design

Anthony I. Wasserman
1975 Proceedings of the May 19-22, 1975, national computer conference and exposition on - AFIPS '75  
The past few years have witnessed an increased understanding of the relationship between programming languages and problem solving. Programming is now understood to be a rather difficult task which requires the simultaneous application of principles, skills, and art. 1 ,2,3 Computer scientists have recognized that the features of a programming language can have a significant effect upon the ease with which reliable programs can be developed. It has also been observed that certain languages and
more » ... anguage features are particularly well suited for the use of systematic programming techniques, while others hinder or discourage such discipline. 4 ,5,6 Of course, it is possible to write well-structured, clearly organized programs in any programming language, but such programs have often been the exception rather than the rule. As a result of this work, there have been numerous developments in. the general area of programming languages. Among these are the following: (1) a significant number of new programming languages have been designed and/ or implemented,1 with several developed principally to promote proper programming practices;8,9,lo (2) the general features of existing and proposed languages have been analyzed in an attempt to identify desirable characteristics of programming languages;1l,12,13,14 strong criticism has been directed at those languages which do not appear to contain the requisite features for the systematic development of reliable software;15,16 (3) preprocessors have been implemented for several programming languages, thereby allowing programmers to use "structured programming" techniques; (4) direct modifications have been designed and/ or implemented for several programming languages, in order to enhance their suitability for program development; (5)· general design criteria for programming languages have been advanced, with attention focused on the need for a language to have a sound theoretical basis;17,18
doi:10.1145/1499949.1500006 dblp:conf/afips/Wasserman75 fatcat:iry6yq7utje6fejax4vcwada2q