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From: jeff@aiai.uucp (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: Which language to teach first?
Message-ID: <761@skye.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 18 Aug 89 17:10:50 GMT
References: <2584@aplcen.apl.jhu.edu> <6226@hubcap.clemson.edu> <1304@batserver.cs.uq.oz> <741@skye.ed.ac.uk> <178@castle.ed.ac.uk>
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Reply-To: jeff@aiai.uucp (Jeff Dalton)
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland
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In article <178@castle.ed.ac.uk> db@lfcs.ed.ac.uk (Dave Berry) writes:
>In article <741@skye.ed.ac.uk> jeff@aiai.uucp (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>>a functional language might just be a subset of a procedural one
>
>A functional language is a language that has functions as first class values.
>An imperative or procedural language is one that supports (re-)assignment.

I don't think those definitions are quite right, but they'll do for now.

>Languages that support both are not subsets of either style; they are hybrids.

That is true, but beside the point.

It is certainly possible to have a language that has a functional
subset.  Scheme, Common Lisp, and Standard ML are examples of
languages that have such a subset.  So, if I want to use a functional
language, I might use one of these sublanguages.  That was all I was
trying to say.  If you want to say "a subset isn't a language" that's
fine with me, but I don't think it's very important.

-- Jeff