1. Programming Language Basics

2. What is a Programming Language?
“A computer, human-created language used to write instructions for a computer.”
“An artificial language that enables people to instruct machines. Computer commands that form procedures by which software programmers design and implement computer software programs.”
“A computer tool that allows a programmer to write commands in a format that is more easily understood or remembered by a person, and in such a way that they can be translated into codes that the computer can understand and execute.”

3. High Level vs. Low Level
A high level programming language is one that is easy to learn and similar to English
A low level programming language is more difficult to learn but more closely resembles what actually goes on inside a computer

4. Machine Code
At the lowest level, we have machine code which consists of 0’s and 1’s
Computers ultimately can only understand machine code
Machine code can look something like what you saw in the movie The Matrix

6. High Level Code
On the other hand, high level language code is much easier for us to understand and write
Examples of high level programming languages?
Java, Visual Basic, C/C++, Turing, Fortran, Pascal

7. What High Level Code Looks Like in Turing
if grade >= 60 then
put “You passed!”
else
put “You failed!”
end if

8. What High Level Code Looks Like in Java
if (grade >= 60) {
System.out.println(“You passed”); }
else
System.out.println(“You failed”);

9. The Compiler
A compiler is a program that translates high level program code into low level machine code
A compiler usually checks your high level code for syntax errors before translating it

10. if (grade >= 60)
printf (“You passed!”);
else
printf (“You failed!”);
High level code
machine code
compile