American Heritage Dictionary says a programmer is "One who programs, especially: (a) Computer Science. One who writes computer programs."

Word Net (Princeton) says A programmer is: "a person who designs and writes and tests computer programs."

"...Someone who writes or debugs computer programs, for a living or for fun. "Analyst/developer" is a common equivalent job title, implying the added role of system analysis. The term may be qualified according to the type of software - "application programmer", "system programmer", etc. (The Free Online Dictionary of Computing)"

What I take from all that is that the term "programmer" applies rather liberally to anyone who creates computer code. It doesn't distinguish between amatures, professionals, proficient or novice. It doesn't distinguish between specialists or those with a broad but shallow knowlege level. It doesn't care whether the person owning the term has one tool in his belt, or a slew of different tools.

Knowing and using Perl to create programs makes a person a programmer, in that the person using Perl is programming.

Now, if I understand your final question, you're asking if there are individuals here who are proficient in several programming languages. That question seems as easily answered as asking a group of residents in Los Angeles if any among them are bi-lingual. Or asking a group of motorcycle riders if any of them also know how to drive cars. The answer should be fairly obvious; yes, of course there are some people here who have learned to wield more than one tool.

Which ones? What brand cars do people here drive? Does it matter? There are thousands of people who frequent the Monastery. Surely you'll find almost every computer programming language to be known by at least one PerlMonk.

What on earth is a "true programmer"? Someone who programs using the one true language using the one true methodology on the one true OS? There ain't no such animal!

It is true that you are likely to learn a greater range of techniques by using a range of languages, but there are people who can write FORTRAN in any language. That doesn't make them more or less programmers, but it may make them more or less good.

One thing that you do learn from using different languages (if you are paying attention anyway) is that they have different strengths and weaknesses and that there is no one language that you would wish to use for all tasks.

In like fashion to languages, different programmers have different strengths and weaknesses and are suited for different tasks. I've programmed in a bunch of different languages (see my home node) and I know that the more languages you have dabbled in the easier it is to pick up another (same's true for natural languages BTW). So get out there and learn as many languages as you can, can't be anything but good for you.

One thing that you do learn from using different languages (if you are paying attention anyway) is that they have different strengths and weaknesses and that there is no one language that you would wish to use for all tasks.

And this is the same view that I have about knowing one or possibly multiple languages. Each have their own style that fit better with specific tasks. If anything I believe that your fluency of one or more languages classifies you as a programmer. Finding new or "cool" uses for a particular language. I think it all rests on skill and usability soley on the person's end.


"Es gibt mehr zu Leben als Bücher, kennen Sie. Aber nicht viel mehr " -(Der Smiths)

I did check out your home node and I noticed that you mostly code in C++ and I was looking into learning that language next though that is further down the line for me. I hope to learn as many programming languages as possible and have perl as my 'base' language.


"Es gibt mehr zu Leben als Bücher, kennen Sie. Aber nicht viel mehr " -(Der Smiths)

And some people say that just knowing one language makes you not a programmer.

Just knowing English doesn't make you a writer. However, one can be a writer even if English is the only language you know.

So my question here is, do any of you code or are pretty handy with any other programming languages and if so, which ones?

I do most of my work in Perl, with a smattering of JavaScript and various UNIX shell languages (for web based stuff, and cron jobs and/or sysadmin utilities, as appropriate).

As for which languages I'm 'handy' with, I've been pretty good with a few languages, but I've not used them in so long aside from minor debugging that I have no idea how good I am anymore in them (PHP, C Fortran, VBA, PL/SQL). I've recently been doing some work in IDL (Interactive Data Language, not Interface Description Language), and there are a number of languages that I haven't touched in years, that I've basically forgotten them (LPC, C++, Logo, Basic/Basica, CFScript, 68k assembler, Pascal, HyperScript). I've also done some work debugging/modifying programs in languages that I don't know (copy & paste coding ... I mean 'coding by example') ... mostly Java, Python and AppleScript.

Does learning more languages make you a better programmer? Well, yes and no ... They make you think about the problems in different ways ... sometimes it's because a language doesn't have a feature that you're used to, but sometimes it's because it has better ways of handling the same logic. (eg, IDL doesn't have a concept of an empty array, or a foreach loop, but it does have 'where', which returns the array indices that match a given expression)

In other cases, I find it's easier to learn some concepts in specific languages (sort of like Heinlein's 'Stranger in a Strange Land' -- you had to learn Martian so you could then understand the concepts before Mike could teach you the higher sciences). I got most of my OO lessons in LPC, concepts of optimization in assembly, structuring your programs in Pascal, etc.

Sure, I use my perl script cgrep: Egrep clone with function name display mostly for grepping through large C or C++ source trees, in fact that's why I wrote it originally.

Also, nowdays I sometimes write perl as a prototyping language: I write a program in perl furst and then compile it to C++.

I also recommend you to read the argument where Knuth explains why he's created a new virtual machine in The Art Of Computer Programming chapter 1.

He explains that you shouldn't fear from learning new computer languages, although as I remember it, he doesn't imply that you neccessarily had to know multiple languages to program.

Alan Perlis said: A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing. But I believe that the inverse of this is true as well. It is worth learning a new language if it can give you new ideas about programming.

In the same vein, Eric Raymond said in his How to Become a Hacker essay: But be aware that you won't reach the skill level of a hacker or even merely a programmer if you only know one or two languages — you need to learn how to think about programming problems in a general way, independent of any one language. To be a real hacker, you need to get to the point where you can learn a new language in days by relating what's in the manual to what you already know. This means you should learn several very different languages.

Likewise, it is possible to be a Real Programmer without using any programming languages. See The Story of Mel :)

For me personally, my job currently involves programming in Perl, Java, Javascript, PL/SQL and (blech) VB. Plus languages like XSLT and SQL that aren't really "programming" languages. I also like Haskell and have toyed in the past with Lisp, Pascal and Standard ML, (update oy, how could I have forgotten C?!) and have decided I probably ought to learn Python and/or Ruby also.

Currently? I use (roughly in order of percent time) Fortran, Perl, JavaScript, VBScript, C, C++, HTML, and VB. In the recent past, I've also worked in (in no particular order) SQL, various *ix scripting languages (csh, ksh, Bourne), awk, sed, PL/1, COBOL (as little as possible 8-) ), JCL, CLISTS, specialized simulation languages, assembler, and IITRAN.