[rickydroll]

It seems like the term "scripting language" has become a pejorative; denigrating a programming language as somehow less worthy for "serious" programs than non-scripting languages. To me, when I hear someone describe a language as a scripting language, it says more about how they think about programming than the functionality and applicability of a language for solving different classes of problems.

I'm coming to think different programing languages are more like a patois or creole. an expression of ideas shaped by the speaker's thoughts and experience in the world. Sometimes the patois de jour taps into a common experience (e.g. python) or not (e.g. forth).

[seanhunter]

100% agree. And just like you don’t talk to a new-born child in quantifier logic and you don’t attempt to write a PhD thesis in babytalk, there are places where more or less rigorous and exacting language is appropriate.

It used to be the general consensus was that “scripting” comprised quick and temporary automation of tasks and therefore the emphasis in a language was on something convenient and expressive that could get a bunch of stuff done quickly even if the semantics were a bit janky (I’m looking at you bourne shell). Then perl really opened a lot of people’s eyes to what could be done with “scripting languages” (both in terms of power and in terms of the horror that could unleash in the wrong hands) and there has since been a gradual shift towards simplicity and understandability given that there are few things more permanent than a temporary script.