LiveCode Forums.

How to explain to my customers. whether livecode is C++ or a new programming language like ruby, php. because my customers see github livecode. 70% of the livecode is written in c ++. my customers compare with qt. because qt is not a programming language.

thanks for all who helped

What sort of client frequents GitHub yet doesn't understand what a scripting engine is?

C++ or a new programming language

Well, frankly, Github leaves me mystified.

But I am well aware that LiveCode is neither C++ nor a new programming language.

1. C++ is a programming language: and as LiveCode is NOT C++ how can it be C++?
(a spot of basic logic might not be a bad idea.)

2. LiveCode is certainly NOT new: I know because I have been using it for 20 years.

2.1. LiveCode has developed out of MetaCard (proximally) and HyperCard (at a further remove),
and HyperCard is very nearly 40 years old.

3. LiveCode contains a programming language (which, just to keep us on our toes, keeps changing its name).

Sometimes, for some odd reason, I think people ask these sorts of questions without
having a think first.

it would be best for one to know : "why is a client asking you some questions about your working tool ?

if they do coding, they probably wont need to ask much about it...
if they are not into coding : then what do they really wonder about, speed perf ? reliabilty..else ?
*understanding why they ask something - helps you give them the right and true answer...
not knowing why or what it is that they want to be assured of...is like playing darts with your eyes closed, fewer chances to give it in the middle !

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programmi ... enerations

This is interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programmi ... enerations

mainly because I cannot work out where LiveCode should be:

1. 4GL languages tend to be specialized toward very specific programming domains.

2. A fifth-generation programming language (5GL) is any programming language based on problem-solving
using constraints given to the program, rather than using an algorithm written by a programmer.

For years I have been telling people that LiveCode is a fifth-generation programming language: and, quite obviously,
if that Wikipedia article is anything to go on, I was speaking out of my bottom:

1. "using an algorithm written by a programmer": well, I think we'd all be hard put to get anything really worthwhile out
of LiveCode without the "odd" algorithm here and there.

2. "the user only needs to worry about what problems need to be solved and what conditions need to be met, without worrying about how to implement a routine or algorithm to solve them" . . . I wonder how one can cook up an algorithm in the first place
if one doesn't know what it is going to do?

Admittedly, I cannot work out what 456,789 cubed is without an awful lot of work with a pencil, but before I implement
an algorithm to find out what 456,789 cubed is, I might just, possibly, try it out with an result I know (err . . . say . . . 3 cubed).

3. I cannot see how LiveCode is specialized towards "very specific programming domains."
In fact one only has to "flap one's ears" on these forums to work out LiveCode can be used for almost anything.

The truth of the matter is, that like the bizarre, linear idea that humans are at the top of a "great chain of being", instead of one branch of a cladistic evolutionary process, describing programming languages as generations 1,2,3,4 & 5 is hugely over-simplistic and rather misleading.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/8/eaay5483

While LiveCode Script isn't C++, the LiveCode script engine it runs on IS written in C++.

While LiveCode Script isn't C++, the LiveCode script engine it runs on IS written in C++.

True, but not really relevant when 'prawns' ask "whether livecode is C++."

As far as I recall, C++ was probably written in machine code . . .

richmond62 wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:27 pm

While LiveCode Script isn't C++, the LiveCode script engine it runs on IS written in C++.

True, but not really relevant when 'prawns' ask "whether livecode is C++."

As far as I recall, C++ was probably written in machine code . . .

Hmm, I thought it was precisely relevant to "How to explain to" (someone who has no clue) "whether livecode is C++" and why GitHub would list it as C++.

richmond62 wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:27 pm

As far as I recall, C++ was probably written in machine code . . .

I'd tend to doubt that

C++ was an improvement (or intended to be one) of C.

C was an improvement (or intended to be one) of B

...and so on , and so forth.

B, C, and C++ can write themselves (or maybe I should say, can write the compiler that compiles itself?). They can also write their own OS, as you can deal with low level hardware and write boot routines.

I'd tend to agree with Paul on this one, though I might phrase it differently, and as Richard pointed out, if they don't understand what a scripting engine is, you'd probably wind up at least having to give a more full explanation of it.

why GitHub would list it as C++

If GitHub does that it gives an entirely false impression of what LiveCode is,
whether or not the under-pinnings of LiveCode are written in C++.

And telling questioners "LiveCode is C++" is probably not much more helpful than saying "French is Latin."

If LiveCode were C++, a child, having learnt how to do things in LiveCode would be able to do exactly the same things in C++
without further instruction, and the other way round: but, in both cases, this is just not true.

I'd tend to doubt that

Well you would, as proximally it is untrue.

But, just as tables and chairs are made from wood, and wood is made from molecules,
and molecules are composed of atoms, . . . leptons, hadrons,
muons, gluons . . . strings . . . so C++ is written in machine code.

richmond62 wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:52 pm

why GitHub would list it as C++

If GitHub does that it gives an entirely false impression of what LiveCode is,
whether or not the under-pinnings of LiveCode are written in C++.

And telling questioners "LiveCode is C++" is probably not much more helpful than saying "French is Latin."

If LiveCode were C++, a child, having learnt how to do things in LiveCode would be able to do exactly the same things in C++
without further instruction, and the other way round: but, in both cases, this is just not true.

I'm not haggling over semantics. If you look at the source code for LiveCode engine, it's mostly C++, I'm sure any of the team from the mothership would confirm this. GitHub uses some sort of algorithm to try to determine a language some code is written in. There isn't enough LiveCode Script (and it would have to be a script-only "stack") or LiveCode Builder code on GitHub for those to even register and make it into their language list file (which I've personally looked into to updating via pull request). If more people would share their LC code on GitHub maybe that will eventually change.
Here's a screenshot of how GitHub lists the languages used in my own, mostly LiveCode Builder, repos as C, C++,AppleScript, etc.:

richmond62 wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:54 pm

But, just as tables and chairs are made from wood, and wood is made from molecules,
and molecules are composed of atoms, . . . leptons, hadrons,
muons, gluons . . . strings . . . so C++ is written in machine code.

No, it isn't, it compiles to machine code, it is *not* written in it heh, it is (at this time) written in itself, literally.

bogs wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:51 pm

B, C, and C++ can write themselves (or maybe I should say, can write the compiler that compiles itself?).

I recall that was one of the goals for LC IDE/LiveCode Builder (not sure if it still is), to have it's source be written in itself.

Well, that certainly isn't an impossibility, but it would be a tougher way to go about it. Almost any language can write a compiler, and I don't see writing source code files to be particularly difficult either (probably the easiest part of the whole process actually), putting it together might be a bit of a challenge though.