User talk:67.62.122.162

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Hi,

The page Programming language has been the subject of quite a few controversial revisions of late; you might participate in the discussion on its talk page. Comments in edit summaries are no substitute for a good discussion in the talk page.

At any rate, the point which I was trying to make is that programming languages are used for machine-to-machine control; Postscript is an excellent example. Not all inter-machine protocols are programming languages (nobody would suggest that the X protocol is a "language", for instance), but Postscript definitely is.

The line is a very fuzzy one. Yes, machines do control other machines. Do machines 'write' programs that they then use to communicate with other machines? I guess they do. Are such languages 'programming languages'? The author of this bullet point thinks not. I don't see what point your postscript sentence makes and I think it creates confusion. Perhaps other wording might make your intent clear? 67.62.122.162 21:27, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Also, you might consider creating an account for yourself. Just click on the "sign in" link on the upper right of the window, and you'll have your own account in a few minutes. (If you have an account and forgot to log in, my apologies). --EngineerScotty 21:17, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

While you haven't approached the limit yet; you might familarize yourself with the three revert rule. Repeatedly reverting another user's edits is not permitted; and violations of 3RR can lead to you being blocked if egregious. The point of 3RR is to encourage discussion, as opposed to revert wars. --EngineerScotty 21:22, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. It appears that Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters regards points of view he/she does not agree with as vandalism. 67.62.122.162 21:27, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Huh? I think you're confusing my edits with someone else's. Also, I agree with Scotty w.r.t. getting a user account. k.lee 21:39, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
One more point on the user account. It is highly likely that Lulu's talk page is sprotected--protected from writing by anonymous IPs. This often happens when a user page or talk page is a frequent target of vandalism. If you get a user account, you'll be able to add comments to his talk page. --EngineerScotty 21:41, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Sorry K.lee, got you confused with Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters.

The metaprogramming point is very interesting and relevant (and is discussed on the PL talk page). Postscript is a good example, but it's not unique. Postscript is a Turing complete language than some people indeed do write by hand. But it's mostly written by machines. In contrast DOT (which may or may not be a PL) is about half-and-half. In producing the graphs on PL, I generated some of the DOT language sources using Python programs, and edited others by hand. At the other extreme, I know many people who programmatically generate Lisp source code, or Python source code, or C source code (Pyrex is an interesting example of generating C based on a Python superset language); but clearly, those languages are usually written by humans directly. LotLE×talk 21:56, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Assembler, or at least machine code, is mostly machine generated ie, by a compiler. Does this make assembler an example of metaprogramming? Yes, postscript is mostly generated by machines, but the generation is controlled by the text people write. Yes, the jump from me writing a report to postscript is much bigger than from Java to byte-code but the principle is the same. I'm sure a suitably clever person code get a printer to obey byte code and create a pdf to byte-code translator. Where is the meta-programming in this? 67.62.122.162 22:39, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Tell you what: search google for "metaprogramming python". The first hit is too me, as well as a couple others in the top ten. Sadly, if you just search for "metaprogramming" by itself, I don't appear until about 25th place :-). I think I know what metaprogramming is. LotLE×talk 02:29, 29 June 2006 (UTC)