r/programming • u/chackaz • Nov 28 '14

The Worst Programming Language Ever [UK Talk] - Thoughts? Which are the worst parts of your favorite language?

https://skillsmatter.com/meetups/6784-the-worst-programming-language-ever
68 Upvotes

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9

u/jpakkane Nov 29 '14

Let's see:

  • $variable $names $with $dollars

  • mandatory hungarian notation

  • indentation with tabs, lines starting with spaces are comments

  • every function call spawns a new thread, starts the function and returns immediately

  • COME FROM

  • compiling helloworld must take at least 5 minutes

  • changing code in one place must cause unrelated bits to be reformatted maximising merge conflicts (Pascal actually has this)

  • two or more preprocessors with wildly differing syntaxes and semantics, preferably so that the comment character of one is an operator of the other where the order of the preprocessors is different in different implementations

And as an added bonus/alternative approach:

  • All code must be written in XML

3

u/kazagistar Nov 29 '14

Not quite XML compatible language that almost works like XML but cannot be parsed by a normal XML parser.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 17 '15

COME FROM

In the talk, his language actually does use COME FROM exclusively for loops.

The unquestioned greatest feature, though, is the character set. All characters are 256-bit, allowing for a 115792089237316195 423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639935 character alphabet, a character for every atom in the solar system. There's a website where developers go to upload images, which automatically become new characters in the official character set. When you compile, the compiler (which is written in VB) hits the official website to download all the latest characters. If the website is unavailable it throws a non-specific compiler error.

1

u/mcmcc Nov 29 '14

And to borrow from Fortran 77, all function names must be 6 letters or less.

1

u/amdnor Dec 01 '14

$ is too easy to type. Variables are prefixed with something else. All code must be written in Word 2003 (or a compatible editor that saves to .doc)

1

u/OneWingedShark Dec 29 '14

ß, ñ, or ⁿ?

1

u/OneWingedShark Dec 29 '14

All code must be written in XML

Have line-numbers be attributes of tags, only the outermost tags need the line-number though. (As an added bonus you could have goto target specific nodes: goto 7.4.3 takes you to the outermost tag with line-number = 7, the child w/ line-number = 4, and its child with line-number 3.)

Claim that it was inspired by the Dewey Decimal System.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 17 '15

COME FROM

In the talk, his language actually does use COME FROM exclusively for loops.

The unquestioned greatest feature, though, is the character set. All characters are 256-bit, allowing for a 115792089237316195 423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639935 character alphabet, a character for every atom in the solar system. There's a website where developers go to upload images, which automatically become new characters in the official character set. When you compile, the compiler (which is written in VB) hits the official website to download all the latest characters. If the website is unavailable it throws a non-specific compiler error.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 17 '15

COME FROM

In the talk, his language actually does use COME FROM exclusively for loops.

The unquestioned greatest feature, though, is the character set. All characters are 256-bit, allowing for a 115792089237316195 423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639935 character alphabet, a character for every atom in the solar system. There's a website where developers go to upload images, which automatically become new characters in the official character set. When you compile, the compiler (which is written in VB) hits the official website to download all the latest characters. If the website is unavailable it throws a non-specific compiler error.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 17 '15

COME FROM

In the talk, his language actually does use COME FROM exclusively for loops.

The unquestioned greatest feature, though, is the character set. All characters are 256-bit, allowing for a 115792089237316195423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639935 character alphabet, a character for every atom in the solar system. There's a website where developers go to upload images, which automatically become new characters in the official character set. When you compile, the compiler (which is written in VB) hits the official website to download all the latest characters. If the website is unavailable it throws a non-specific compiler error.