Re: localized languages, was call by name

glen herrmannsfeldt <gah@ugcs.caltech.edu> writes:


> I have wondered about what non-english speakers think about the
> english keywords used in the usual programming languages.
>
> It might be that some use a preprocessor to replace language appropriate
> keywords, but I believe most just use the usual english words.

That seems to be the case in Denmark, at least.  There have been a few
programming languages for primary school education that used Danish
keywords, such as "Myresnak" (= "ant talk", a LOGO variant).  But
since teaching programming to school kids has gone out of fashion,
these are, AFAIK, not used anymore.

I'm not really sure using native-language keywords is a benefit, even
for kids, as the keywords usually have a slightly different (or at
least more specific) meaning than normal English usage.  I have, for
example, often found the words "object", "class" and "inheritance"
misleading and confusing.

Torben

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Glen,
 

The results of the following experiment suggest that there is a lot of
natural language information in identifiers:
www.knosof.co.uk/cbook/accu07a.pdf

I have tried to get researchers from non-native English speaking
countries interested in investigating their country-mens use of native
language in source code.  This seems to be a touchy subject with
people claiming that developers in their country all knowing English
very well and using it 'properly' in code.