The Expanding C-Family Of Programming Languages

Three of today's most widely used programming languages, C++, Java, and C#, have much in common:

• They're all derived from C and contain a C-like procedural subset.
• They all support and exploit the object paradigm.
• They all support to some degree Internet deployment.
• They draw upon similar standard libraries.
• They may be regarded as dialects of the same language, a tidied-up C with object-oriented extensions.

A programmer who masters one of them can, with slight effort, feel comfortable using either of the others. Surprisingly, many programmers don’t feel comfortable at all switching between, say C++ and either Java or C#. To have embraced one of them as one’s preferred programming tool too often implies intense dislike for the others and even disrespect for the other languages’ community of programmers.

That’s unfortunate indeed. Instead of working to simplify the world of programming, we’re making it unnecessarily more complicated by introducing more and more incompatibilities and other obstacles to learning and sharing. How should today’s responsible professionals deal with those three similar programming languages and the growing arrays of support libraries and related tools? Conrad Weisert will examine a few of the opportunities and obstacles, and will suggest a practical approach for the professional programmer.

8th Light (https://8thlight.com), our newest corporate sponsor, will be providing food and beverages at the meeting.