Ten Mini-Languages: A Study of Topical Issues in Programming Languages
- 1 September 1971
- journal article
- Published by Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) in ACM Computing Surveys
- Vol. 3 (3) , 115-146
- https://doi.org/10.1145/356589.356592
Abstract
The proliferation of programming languages has raised many issues of language design, definition, and implementation. This paper presents a series of ten mini-languages, each of which exposes salient features found in existing programming languages. The value of the mini-languages lies in their brevity of description and the isolation of important linguistic features: in particular, the notions of assignment, transfer of control, functions, parameter passing, type checking, data structures, string manipulation, and input/output. The mini-languages may serve a variety of uses: notably, as a pedagogical tool for teaching programming languages, as a subject of study for the design of programming languages, and as a set of test cases for methods of language implementation or formal definition.Keywords
This publication has 5 references indexed in Scilit:
- The next 700 programming languagesCommunications of the ACM, 1966
- AXLE2Communications of the ACM, 1965
- Correspondence between ALGOL 60 and Church's Lambda-notationCommunications of the ACM, 1965
- A proposal for input-output conventions in ALGOL 60Communications of the ACM, 1964
- Revised report on the algorithmic language ALGOL 60Communications of the ACM, 1963