Programming Lang Chapter One Review
Whichproducesfasterprogramexecution,acompilerorapure interpreter?
A compiler will produce faster program execution due to the fact that translating high level language to machine code is substantially more complex.
How does the overall simplicity of a programming language affect its readability
A language with a large number of basic constructs is more difficult to learn than one with a smaller numbers. The programmer may not have knowledge of all the features in the program
Which is the first successful high-level programming language for business?
COBOL
What are the three general methods of implementing a programming language?
Compiler Implementation Just In Time (JIT) or interpreted implementation
Which programming language for scientific applications was the first to be used successfully?
Fortran
Which is the most popular markup language for Web development?
HTML
Why is too much orthogonality a detriment to "writability"?
If all combinations are meaningful, errors are difficult to detect
Why is it essential to choose an appropriate programming language for a specific software solution?
If the programmers know the implementation details of some construct, they can understand how to execute tasks more efficiently.
In which programming language were most of the AI applications developed prior to 1990?
Lisp was used until 1970, then Prolog
What role does the symbol table play in a compiler?
Serves as the database during the whole compilation process and stores type and attribute information.
Why does too much orthogonality cause problems?
Too many combinations. Unnecessary Complexity
Why is the VAX instruction design orthogonal?
a single instruction can use either registers or memory cells as the operands
Why is a list of programming language evaluation criteria for the development of software controversial?
because it is difficult to get even two computer scientists to agree on the value of some given language characteristic relative to others.
Give an example of expressivity in a language.
in C, the notation count++ is more convenient and shorter than count = count + 1.
What two programming language deficiencies were discovered as a result of the research in software development in the 1970s?
incompleteness of type checking and inadequacy of control statements
How does the execution of a machine code program on a von Neumann architecture computer occur?
process called the fetch-execute cycle. Instruction is fetched from memory and is executed in the CPU
Why is it useful for a programmer to have the ability to learn new languages, even though he or she may have a good knowledge of a number of programming languages?
One cannot learn all the programming languages used in the computing industry AND learning a new programming/natural language is a tedious process
What are the advantages in implementing a language with a pure interpreter?
Platform independence/easier to debug/flexibility
What are the three fundamental features of an object-oriented program- ming language?
Polymorphism, inheritance, and encapsulation
What language was the first to support the three fundamental features of object-oriented programming?
Smalltalk
What is type checking?
Testing for type errors in a given program.
What is the use of the well-definedness criterion?
The completeness and precision of the language's official defining document
How is the total cost of a programming language calculated?
The cost of all the resources used in a program.
Explain how "writability" is used as a measure of how easily a language can be used to create programs.
The easier a program is to write, the more likely it is to be correct.
What does a linker do?
The object files produced by the compiler and the library files are combined by the linker to make a single executable file
What is an example of two language design criteria that are in direct conflict with each other?
reliability and cost of execution
What is portability of a language?
the ease with which programs can be moved from one implementation to another
