Re: spate of programming languages

[Aron Felix Gurski <agurski@sn.no>]

Ramesh S. Mantri wrote:
> 
> Hi,
>         My question is actually regarding Modula-3, so I do not know
> whether this is an appropraite place to post this article.
>         I have been programming for nearly 10 years now but only in the
> academic environment. So my interest is mainly concerning the features
> provided by various PLs. Quite recently I started learning Ada hoping
> that I might find it useful someday. So far it has been a good experience.
>         I was told that Modula-3 was another good language. So I browsed
> through a book on Modula-3. I was surprised to find the wealth of features
> that it provides, some of which seemed to me to have been borrowed from Ada.
> Is that true? Next, the book says Modula-3 was developed at SRC, DEC. Pardon
> my ignorance, but I always thought Modula-2 was developed by Nicklaus Wirth
> et al. If so, is it not a violation of some sort of copyrights to borrow the
> name Modula-3?

The book is correct about where Modula-3 was developed. The people who developed
Modula-3 were, as you might expect, familiar with Modula-2 in the form that it
had at that time. When they started working on the design of Modula-3, they did
have contact with Niklaus Wirth. It was in order to discuss the design of the
language, though, not because they were worried about the name. The name 
Modula-xx is not a registered trademark (unlike PL/1 up to PL/100). I wasn't
involved in the development of Modula-3, so I can't say for sure, but I doubt
that Wirth had anything agains using the name Modula-3.

>         The number of Programming Languages which have been developed is so
> large that it does not seem possible to me to browse through all the language
> features, let alone program using these languages : Fortran-90, Ada, C, C++,
> Eiffel, Modula-3, Java, ... to mention a few. Can someone suggest where to look
> if one is interested in finding it out the State-of-the-Art of research in
> Programming Languages? I am aware of only ACM Transactions on Programming
> Languages. ( Just curious ... )

Aside from the ACM journals, I use the Usenet comp.* conferences to try to keep
up with what is happening in the world of programming languages. It isn't easy!

> regards.
> --- Ramesh Mantri