8 ms·

I’m skeptical. There are more people writing PHP and Ruby than HTML? And HTML is a programming language? Those two very surprising results make me doubt the oth

I’m skeptical. There are more people writing PHP and Ruby than HTML? And HTML is a programming language? Those two very surprising results make me doubt the others. Elixir behind OCaml? Possible, I guess, but I know of several large Elixir shops and I haven’t heard much of OCaml in a while.

riffraff 1y ago
Perhaps the people who pick HTML as "what programming language do you use" are a small number :)
wormius 1y ago
HTML is a declarative programming language. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming#Domain-specific_languages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming#Domain...
- kstrauser 1y ago
  Nah. It’s a declarative language, but not a programming language. To prove me wrong, show an HTML program that does any kind of computation whatsoever. There’s not one. It’s not Turing complete. I doubt it’s even Turing partial. It’s a markup language, not a PL.
  - rekenaut 1y ago
    Where does this idea that a programming language has to be Turing complete come from? As far as I can tell from cursory searches, the most broadly understood understanding of a programming language is a formal language for directing computations on a computer. HTML does this, CSS does this, and SQL does this. Frankly even configuration languages like YAML or the spare INI file do this in the proper context. Can these languages do everything or even most computations you would be interested in doing in a computer? Of course not. But why should the definition be restricted to languages that can do everything?
    - ctenb 1y ago
      Your definition is overly broad and makes everything a programming language, at which point the term isn't useful anymore.
      - ngruhn 1y ago
        But Turing completeness is also too broad. Otherwise Power point animations and Conways game of life are programming languages.
        ashirviskas 1y ago
        I will take this over HTML
        alkonaut 1y ago
        Yes. So a criteria that is below Turing Completeness but which wouldn't make markdown a programming language. Shouldn't be _that_ hard to find such criteria. E.g. "Has some form of logic/flow control". Can perform computation/"execute". etc.
        gf000 1y ago
        I mean, CS is famously bad at exact definitions [1]. Why should we have one for what a PL is? Just do what humans have been doing for millenia, how is it commonly used. A tomato is a vegetable from a culinary perspective, and HTML is not a PL based on its use case and its literal name. [1] what is a low or high level language? Strongly typed language?
  - jpardy 1y ago
    Is CSS included in the HTML, if so then it is turing complete, maybe? See: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2497146/is-css-turing-complete https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2497146/is-css-turing-co...
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
- brodo 1y ago
  If HTML is a programming language, why not SVG? If SVG is a programming language, why not PNG? Is your image viewer just an interpreter executing PNG code? Maybe being a programming language is a spectrum...
  - 1718627440 1y ago
    Yes, if you go down this road then the equivalence of code and data means that everything is a programming language.
BuildItBusk 1y ago
As mentioned, HTML is indeed a programming language. But it’s one that is rarely used on its own. So you could argue that having it as a thing of itself in these lists, makes little sense.
- kstrauser 1y ago
  I contest this. It has no features of programming languages: no way to set or read variables, or to evaluate expressions, or any kind of flow control. If it’s a programming language, so is Markdown. (It’s not, either.)
  - microflash 1y ago
    Take a look at this conditional here: <picture> <source media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" srcset="logo_dark.svg"> <img src="logo.svg" alt="logo" width="48"> </picture>
    - koakuma-chan 1y ago
      "(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" is CSS
- munchler 1y ago
  HTML on its own is not Turing complete, so it’s not a programming language in any practical sense. It’s a markup language.
  - ngruhn 1y ago
    not sure if that's a good criterion. There are also non Turing complete languages like core SQL or Rocq that definitely feel like programming.
    - a96 1y ago
      Things can and often do feel like other things that they are not.
obezyian 1y ago
A couple of Java programmers from my first job were stopped by police while drinking in a park. When asked what they do for a living, they said they were programmers. Then the police officer went: – Oh, I see. HTML.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
tasuki 1y ago
We all live in our own bubbles. I still think Scala is a really popular language!
makeitdouble 1y ago
> There are more people writing PHP and Ruby than HTML? Intuitevely I'd say yes. In most jobs I've been in, the ratio of backend/system devs to front end devs has been from 3:1 to 20:1 depending on the size. Provided I'm on the backend side and would choose companies accordingly, but still. Even for web first services, there will be a flurry of people who won't touch a line of html/rendering.
- 1718627440 1y ago
  But how much PHP code does exist, which does not also produce HTML? I think that's the whole point of most PHP code.
  - makeitdouble 1y ago
    An awful lot. Imagine a PHP backend providing an API for an app. The only HTML ever produced will be the admin backend, and perhaps auth forms for special cases. The surface of the API will produce objects serialized to JSON, and the vast majority of the PHP will be business logic to talk to external services and do what the service is paid for. Some might not like the language, but whole businesses will run on PHP, with a dedicated react or next.js frontend that only talks to the PHP via API.
  - phplovesong 1y ago
    Probably very little. Its either json or html. Most PHP oit there is actually wordpress.

riffraff 1y ago

Perhaps the people who pick HTML as "what programming language do you use" are a small number :)

wormius 1y ago

HTML is a declarative programming language. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming#Domain-specific_languages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming#Domain...

kstrauser 1y ago
Nah. It’s a declarative language, but not a programming language. To prove me wrong, show an HTML program that does any kind of computation whatsoever. There’s not one. It’s not Turing complete. I doubt it’s even Turing partial. It’s a markup language, not a PL.
- rekenaut 1y ago
  Where does this idea that a programming language has to be Turing complete come from? As far as I can tell from cursory searches, the most broadly understood understanding of a programming language is a formal language for directing computations on a computer. HTML does this, CSS does this, and SQL does this. Frankly even configuration languages like YAML or the spare INI file do this in the proper context. Can these languages do everything or even most computations you would be interested in doing in a computer? Of course not. But why should the definition be restricted to languages that can do everything?
  - ctenb 1y ago
    Your definition is overly broad and makes everything a programming language, at which point the term isn't useful anymore.
    - ngruhn 1y ago
      But Turing completeness is also too broad. Otherwise Power point animations and Conways game of life are programming languages.
      - ashirviskas 1y ago
        I will take this over HTML
      - alkonaut 1y ago
        Yes. So a criteria that is below Turing Completeness but which wouldn't make markdown a programming language. Shouldn't be _that_ hard to find such criteria. E.g. "Has some form of logic/flow control". Can perform computation/"execute". etc.
        gf000 1y ago
        I mean, CS is famously bad at exact definitions [1]. Why should we have one for what a PL is? Just do what humans have been doing for millenia, how is it commonly used. A tomato is a vegetable from a culinary perspective, and HTML is not a PL based on its use case and its literal name. [1] what is a low or high level language? Strongly typed language?
- jpardy 1y ago
  Is CSS included in the HTML, if so then it is turing complete, maybe? See: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2497146/is-css-turing-complete https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2497146/is-css-turing-co...
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
brodo 1y ago
If HTML is a programming language, why not SVG? If SVG is a programming language, why not PNG? Is your image viewer just an interpreter executing PNG code? Maybe being a programming language is a spectrum...
- 1718627440 1y ago
  Yes, if you go down this road then the equivalence of code and data means that everything is a programming language.

BuildItBusk 1y ago

As mentioned, HTML is indeed a programming language. But it’s one that is rarely used on its own. So you could argue that having it as a thing of itself in these lists, makes little sense.

kstrauser 1y ago
I contest this. It has no features of programming languages: no way to set or read variables, or to evaluate expressions, or any kind of flow control. If it’s a programming language, so is Markdown. (It’s not, either.)
- microflash 1y ago
  Take a look at this conditional here: <picture> <source media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" srcset="logo_dark.svg"> <img src="logo.svg" alt="logo" width="48"> </picture>
  - koakuma-chan 1y ago
    "(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" is CSS
munchler 1y ago
HTML on its own is not Turing complete, so it’s not a programming language in any practical sense. It’s a markup language.
- ngruhn 1y ago
  not sure if that's a good criterion. There are also non Turing complete languages like core SQL or Rocq that definitely feel like programming.
  - a96 1y ago
    Things can and often do feel like other things that they are not.

obezyian 1y ago

A couple of Java programmers from my first job were stopped by police while drinking in a park. When asked what they do for a living, they said they were programmers. Then the police officer went: – Oh, I see. HTML.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

tasuki 1y ago

We all live in our own bubbles. I still think Scala is a really popular language!

makeitdouble 1y ago

> There are more people writing PHP and Ruby than HTML? Intuitevely I'd say yes. In most jobs I've been in, the ratio of backend/system devs to front end devs has been from 3:1 to 20:1 depending on the size. Provided I'm on the backend side and would choose companies accordingly, but still. Even for web first services, there will be a flurry of people who won't touch a line of html/rendering.

1718627440 1y ago
But how much PHP code does exist, which does not also produce HTML? I think that's the whole point of most PHP code.
- makeitdouble 1y ago
  An awful lot. Imagine a PHP backend providing an API for an app. The only HTML ever produced will be the admin backend, and perhaps auth forms for special cases. The surface of the API will produce objects serialized to JSON, and the vast majority of the PHP will be business logic to talk to external services and do what the service is paid for. Some might not like the language, but whole businesses will run on PHP, with a dedicated react or next.js frontend that only talks to the PHP via API.
- phplovesong 1y ago
  Probably very little. Its either json or html. Most PHP oit there is actually wordpress.