view issue  Languages, Levels, Libraries, and Longevity Download
PDF version of this article  by John R. Mashey | December 27,
2004  Topic: Programming Languages    • View Comments   • Print
Languages, Levels, Libraries, and Longevity     We can gather
insights from the last 50 years of programming systems to the
current time. For the far future, Vernor Vinge’s fine science-
fiction novel, A Deepness in the Sky, rings all too true. The
young protagonist, Pham, has joined a starship crew and is
learning the high-value vocation of “programmer archaeologist,”
as the crew’s safety depends on the ability to find needed code,
use it, and modify it without breaking something. He is
initially appalled at the code he finds:  The programs were
crap…Programming went back to the beginning of time…There were
programs here that had been written five thousand years ago,
before Humankind ever left Earth. The wonder of it—the horror of
it…these programs still worked…down at the very bottom of it was
a little program that ran