to do then now would be retro, to do then then was very nowtro
Log in or Sign Up

Programming Languages

Programming Languages yacitus has used:

Timeline Graph
 
1980
1981
1982
1983
1984
1985
1986
1987
1988
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
6502 Assembly
Commodore BASIC
AppleSoft BASIC
Pascal
C
C++
AppleScript
68k Assembly
Delphi
bash
LISP
Clojure
Erlang
1980–1985
I first started playing with 6502 assembly on the Commodore PETs as I deciphered the PEEKs & POKEs in programs I typed into them from various books and magazines. (There was one programmer who wrote the majority of the programs I found interesting and elegant, but I'm ashamed I can't remember—or find—his name.) I started "real" 6502 programming on the Atari 800 my dad bought me when I was (I think) 15. (And I even had a summer job after my first year of university (1983) mainly writing assembly on an Atari 800. I also had a job perhaps that same summer writing some assembly on a Commodore 64.) I may have written the last of my 6502 assembly the next year for a summer job in Toronto, writing software to teach BASIC programming.
1980–1983
Our high school got Commodore PET computers in 1980, just in time for my first computer programming class. (Previous grade 11 students sent card decks to the university.) I very quickly passed our teacher in knowledge and spent my class time helping others or in self-study. I had a summer job (I think in 1983) automating a salesperson aptitude test on a Commodore 64.
1980–1981
I played with it briefly after winning an Apple II+ in the first annual Alberta High School Computer Programming Competition. But I sold it after deciding I liked my Atari 800 more.
1983–1987
Our second class in computer science at University of Calgary was in Pascal. (The first was in PDP-11 assembly.) I bought Turbo Pascal almost as soon as it came out, and put it to work replacing the BASIC code I wrote to generate price-lists for a family friend's window blinds shop. That turned into more complex software using a database library (also made by Borland, for Turbo Pascal). I continued to maintain this code until I replaced it with a new system written in PICK BASIC.
1983–
Even though C was the programming language used in many of the 3rd & 4th year computer science courses at the University of Calgary, there was no course offered in it. (That was probably for the best.) We were expected to teach ourselves. I did so before I needed to, as I walked by a lab that had the first vector graphics workstation I ever saw, and saw a primitive (though it didn't seem so at the time) 1st-person shooter game and asked what language it was programmed in. The answer was C, of course. Since then, I don't think a year has gone by where I haven't used the language. I continue to like it.
1984–
I first started playing with C++ when I read Bjarne Stroustrup's paper on it and start playing with Cfront in (I think) 1984. I've used it off-and-on ever since, but always with distaste.
1990–
I've played with it off and on, including writing some scripts a few years ago (which I still use) to help me manage podcasts in iTunes. But I wouldn't say I know the language. I always have to look at other examples and dig around to write even the simplest bit of code. I think the designers' attempt to make it english-like made if difficult to grok.
1992–1994
I bought a book on 68K assembly on a day trip to (I think) Great Falls, Montana while visiting a friend in Lethbridge, Alberta, and read it for pleasure. I think that was around 1983. Its orthogonality reminded me of PDP-11 assembly. But I didn't get a chance to use it until programming for System 7 on Macs for Motion Works, starting in 1992, where a reading knowledge of 68K assembly came in handy.
1994–1995
Used it to build a splash screen for the Hasbro Playskool CD-ROM installers. I recall it having a fun and easy learning curve.
2005–
I don't think I wrote BASH scripts until quite late in my career as I was re-introduced to Unix through Linux. I still would rather write a Python script than a 2-line BASH script.
2006
The closest I've come to learning LISP is when I was inspired to read ANSI Common LISP (http://bit.ly/apzLR4) by Paul Graham (I think in 2006) after reading his essays.
2010–
I just started playing with it as I read Seven Languages in Seven Weeks by Bruce Tate (http://bit.ly/cmNUWU) and after attending the SDForum Emerging Tech SIG: Emerging Languages Face Off (http://bit.ly/adzUej).
2010–
Haven't yet got to the Erlang chapter in Seven Languages in Seven Weeks (http://bit.ly/cmNUWU), but I'm looking forward to it.