Object-oriented Programming Languages

In today’s programming world, there are numerous object-oriented programming languages in use. While many of these programming languages share similar characteristics, the each has unique differences that set them aside from each other. Some of the more popular object-oriented programming languages are JAVA, C++, Python, Objective-C, Delphi, and Ruby, which are languages that we will also focus on for the purpose of this commentary. As a starting point, let us focus on the most popular programming language today, JAVA.

The Java programming language is a high-level programming language, also a computing platform, that was introduced to the programming world in 1995 by Sun Microsystems. Programmers normally compile Java applications to bytecode that can function on any Java Virtual Machine. The JAVA language syntax is very similar to the C++ programming language, except the syntax offers a more straightforward object model and less low-level facilities. Sun Microsystems design goals for Java were “Object Oriented, and familiar, robust and secure, architecture neutral and portable, and high performance, interpreted, threaded, and dynamic”.

Bjarne Stroustrup introduced the middle-level programming language C++ in 1979 as an improvement to the C programming language. The “middle-level” classification is a result of the language’s low and high-level language attributes. C++ is an all-purpose programming language that is statically typed, free-form, multi-paradigm, compiled, and utilized in a variety of applications like operating system software, application software, firmware, server and client applications, and gaming software.

The Python programming language is a high-level, interpreted, programming language that was introduced in 1989.The focus of the Python design is on the code reading simplicity and it supports a variety of programming concepts like object oriented, imperative and, to a smaller degree, functional programming styles. Python also shares a comparable dynamic type system and automatic memory management with the Ruby programming language.

The Ruby programming language is also an object-oriented programming language that was introduced in 1993. Ruby was created with the intent to create a programming language that was “more powerful than Perl, and more object-oriented than Python”. Similar to Python, Ruby supports a variety of programming concepts like functional, object oriented, imperative and reflective.

The Objective-C programming language is an object-oriented and reflective programming language that was originated in the 1980s by Brad Cox and Tom Love. Objective-C takes traditional C programming and incorporates Smalltalk-style messaging. In today’s programming world, Objective-C is utilized in Apple operating systems.

The Delphi programming language, originally named Object Pascal, originated from Clascal, a previous version of Pascal, was established in 1986 to support the expandable Macintosh application framework called MacApp. In addition, an Object Pascal extension was incorporated in the Think Pascal IDE. The IDE consists of the “compiler and an editor with Syntax highlighting and checking, a powerful debugger and a class library”.

In conclusion, the aforementioned programming languages are all unique in their own way; but they are all, in some way, shape, or form, associated with one another. Each one of these languages is a mid to high-level programming language, a few have a similar syntax, and others use similar programming concepts. In the end, each of these languages is designed to fulfill objectives that the other languages do not.