[ale] Re: Your scripting class

[Geoffrey]

David S. Jackson wrote:
> On Fri, May 24, 2002 at 05:53:38AM -0400 Geoffrey The Esoteric <esoteric at 3times25.net> wrote:
> 
>>>Yeah, I guess I'd better say that at the outset...although shell isn't
>>>too bad of a "first language."  I guess it's not really a language
>>>though.
>>>
>>Huh?  I guess that depends on your definition of language.  I would say 
>>it's an interpreted programming language, but then again it's more then 
>>that.
>>
> 
> <for the new linux folks>
> 
> I believe what I was thinking of was that the shell depends upon many
> other executables and is at least one step removed from an interpreted
> programming language where you can build executables from scratch
> without calling executables outside the language itself.  In that
> respect, the shell simply executes a string of commands from the
> commandline according to some logic you're able to supply to the
> sequence of commands.
> 
> I think shell scripting languages are  different from other interpreted
> languages in that other interpreted languages (such as perl and python)
> don't necessarily depend on external programs to do their work: perl -e
> 'unlink /home/foo/filename' is different from 'rm /home/foo/filename' in
> that 'unlink' is part of perl while 'rm' isn't strictly part of bash.  
> (ie, perl -e 'unlink foo' doesn't call /bin/unlink.)
> 
> So when you learn bash (or whatever your shell scripting language is),
> you really must learn not just the language structure and syntax itself,
> but also the commands and switches of the external utilities you call,
> such as grep, ls, rm, find, sed, and so on.

Okay, I see where you're going with that thought process.   But, a shell 
does in fact have enough 'stuff' to be a programming language itself. 
Thinks like (for, while, if-else) constructs are all built into the 
language, which are the basic building blocks of a programming language. 
  Granted, shells become much more powerful when you begin using all the 
other slick tools available, but I'd still put shells in the class of a 
programming language.

I think the key is that shells were originally designed to handle 
command line processing.  The fact that they can be used to write 
reasonably complex scripts, with or without external assistance was 
secondary.

SO GUYS, HOW ABOUT THOSE BIOS! :)

> 
> </for the new linux folks>
> 


-- 
Until later: Geoffrey		esoteric at 3times25.net

I didn't have to buy my radio from a specific company to listen
to FM, why doesn't that apply to the Internet (anymore...)?


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