librelist archives

An attempt at grabbing a list of languages

From:

Steve Klabnik

Date:

2011-02-15 @ 02:27

I'm investigating a way to actually collect a list of programming languages.
So far I've done this:

The esolang wiki is public domain-ed. Its list of programming languages is
here:

http://esolangs.org/wiki/Language_list
It has roughly 675 languages. Crazy. There's also a list of 'joke languages'
that aren't as useful for doing actual programming, but are interesting in
some other way:

http://esolangs.org/wiki/Joke_language_list

It's another 30ish.

I also figured that I'd check Wikipedia, and here's its list of languages:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_programming_languages

That's roughly 715 more. Out of those, the only two that managed to actually
get deleted are Alice:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_(programming_language)

and here's its google cache:


http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:lwTkqbPQC-AJ:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_(programming_language)+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=encrypted.google.com

As well as Ambi: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambi_(programming_language)

It does not have a cache that I could find, but here's the project itself:

http://www.davidpratten.com/ambi/

a release announcement on LtU: http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/node/3191

Fancy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fancy_(programming_language)

and cache:


http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:qvYgWFUe6RsJ:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ray49/Fancy_(programming_language)+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=encrypted.google.com


Finally, Mythryl: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mythryl

and cache:


http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:kiD2cOxKh4cJ:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mythryl+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=encrypted.google.com


So... that's a lot. But it is a start.

On Mon, Feb 14, 2011 at 09:27:53PM -0500, Steve Klabnik wrote:
> I'm investigating a way to actually collect a list of programming languages.
> So far I've done this:
> 
> The esolang wiki is public domain-ed. Its list of programming languages is
> here:

675+30+715=1420

Damn that's a lot of languages.  Awesome.  Now to figure out some scheme
for how they'd get published, what might go in the pages, whether we'd
publish them all or have a way to vote them in.

-- 
Zed A. Shaw
http://zedshaw.com/

> Damn that's a lot of languages.  Awesome.  Now to figure out some scheme
> for how they'd get published, what might go in the pages, whether we'd
> publish them all or have a way to vote them in.

Seems like coming up with "Whats get them in the door" would make sense 
with that many languages.  Making a cap of like 100 languages max and just
shoot for that could be ideal too.

Some other things that could go along with your voting... maybe list all 
the languages with a way to go through and focus on if they're better 
suited for different areas of use... And start pruning down so theres a 
few from each category (i.e. better suited for 
UI/database/etc/blah/blah).. this way people who are more interested in 
learning about UI could go for those languages...

-
Corey

> Seems like coming up with "Whats get them in the door" would make sense 
> with that many languages.  Making a cap of like 100 languages max and just
> shoot for that could be ideal too.

Considering that thus far we have a small number of people with not a 
whole lot of time on their hands, I think there's a very simple solution 
to this problem:  if someone other than the language's author takes the 
time to write something up about the language (where "something" is of a 
non-trivial length but doesn't have to be longer than say a few 
paragraphs), it makes it in.  I know that if I have to spend my time 
writing about a language, I'm going to choose one that's worth my time.  I
say choose whatever tickles your fancy.  Choose the one that has the 
prettiest name, the neatest syntax, or the one that uses the keyword "int"
in the most creative way.  Whatever.  It doesn't have to be something 
brilliant that would make it in a prestigious journal about programming 
languages.  Just make sure you have *something* to write about it that 
will be worth yours and your readers' time.

If we end up with hundreds of people wanting to be published in TUPLA, 
then perhaps we can choose a more involved system.  But knowing how these 
things usually work, we'll probably end up with a handful of people that 
contribute and a *ton* of people who promise to contribute.  Thus, a 
system that maximizes the input of people who are actively contributing 
seems to be the best approach.

Here's some more: http://www.andrej.com/plzoo/