I am referring to logic-based languages of any sort and not restricting myself to programming. So markup language would be included. Also, it might be that there are logical approaches for computers envisaged but not yet implemented.
Here is where I am coming from. I have identified and validated 7 distinct ways that people "use language" within my taxonomy (at http://thee-online.com). The 6th way is named "logical" where everything that is said is precise and each term has an unequivocal reference, where consistency and coherence are of paramount importance. You can see a one-page initial summary on the website at: TOP Studio > Frameworks Room > Using Language > Get Oriented > Grasping Foundations
(NB: you need to be logged in to see the TOP Studio menu in the navigation).
It is normal in my taxonomy for there to be a nested hierarchy within the 6th level which contains special systems. In this case it would be a "logical language system/paradigm", and there would be 7 of these, because each would have to draw its rationale or have some correspondence to the 7 "uses of language".
I am conjecturing that computing-oriented languages must be the special nested hierarchy here.
Unfortunatelly, I see no paper on taxonomy at http://thee-online.com, any link leads to the registration menu... as to the topic, any taxonomy has to has a background, the goal it has been introduced. In my opinion, for most situation we meet with the existent taxonomies are well enough. The taxonomies are high/low level languages, and 1st to 5th generations of the languages... as to the generation-based taxonomy I pesonally think that really 1st, 2nd and 4th generations are enough, i. e. the C, Fortran, Pascal languages are 4GLs as well as C++, C#, G(LabVIEW), IEC 61131-3, etc..
Cheers, Vladimir E. Zyubin
Machine languages don't really have a final classification yet.
There are some suggested taxonomies:
1. Programming and scripting languages (give function)
1. a. Formal (every language)
1. b. Natural (there are only attempts in making this. The computer has to understand the command and the problem in order to provide a solution - it is not practical at the moment)
2. Markup languages (give description and make presentation possible)
Programming languages can further be classified into:
1. Declarative languages
1. a. Functional
1. b. Logical
2. Imperative languages
2. a. Procedural
2. b. Object-oriented
Markup languages:
1. Presentational
2. Descriptive
3. Procedural (these come cross as similar to simple scripting languages)
Thanks Milan. Shouldn't we regard basic machine language (just 0's and 1's) as a language? We can't understand it, but it is logical and communicates, doesn't it?
The basic machine language is formal.
The 0 and 1 could be considered as a "script" the language is written in, but the fact that it is still composed of "instructions and arguments" points out that it has a formal structure, so it doesn't have to be any different from any other formal language, such as assembler etc.
Of course, it is not as complex because it has only 1's and 0's, but they have to be grouped into words to make sense and those words are fixed length.
So, in fact. The languages base doesn't turn out to be a 1 or a 0 (a bit), but instead a group... so, again... no different from assemblers movlf or addi etc... the only difference is that the "script" used to write it has more "symbols" in this case.
Dear Warren,
"basic machine language" is a first generation language. Have a look at http://foldoc.org/First+generation+language
with best regards, Vladimir
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