PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE

How a Computer understands PROGRAM :

A program is a set of instructions that tell the computer to do various things; sometimes the instruction it has to perform depends on what happened when it performed a previous instruction. This section gives an overview of the two main ways in which you can give these commands. One way uses an interpreter, the other a compiler. As human languages are too difficult for a computer to understand in an unambiguous way, commands are usually written in one or other languages specially designed for the purpose.

LEVELS  OF  PROGRAMMING  LANGUAGES

There is only one programming language that any computer can actually understand and execute: its own native binary machine code. This is the lowest possible level of language in which it is possible to write a computer program. All other languages are said to be high level or low level according to how closely they can be said to resemble machine code.

In this context, a low-level language corresponds closely to machine code, so that a single low-level language instruction translates to a single machine-language instruction. A high-level language instruction typically translates into a series of machine-language instructions.

A program written in a low-level language can be extremely efficient, making optimum use of both computer memory and processing time. However, to write a low-level program takes a substantial amount of time, as well as a clear understanding of the inner workings of the processor itself. Therefore, low-level programming is typically used only for very small programs, or for segments of code that are highly critical and must run as efficiently as possible.Low level languages are:
1 – Machine Language
2 – Assembly Language

High-level languages permit faster development of large programs. The final program as executed by the computer is not as efficient, but it saves programmer time.High level languages are:

1 – Visual Basic

2 – C

3 – Java

4 – C++ etc

Read the text again and answer the following questions.

1. What is a program?

2. What are the two ways to give commands?

3. Write 3 differences between compiler and interpreter.

4. What is the only programming language that any computer can execute and understand?

5. How does a low level language translate?

6. How does a high level language translate?

7. What is the disadvantage of a low level language?

8. What are the low level languages?

9. What is the advantage of a high level language?

10. What are the high level languages? 

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