Computer language or programming language is a language acceptable to a computer system, and the process of writing instructions in such a language is called coding or programming.
For computer language processing the system needs a translator to convert the language in compiler language so that it can be processed by a machine.
Types of Computer Languages are,
- Machine language.
- Assembly language.
- High-level language.
Machine language
Every computer understands only one language without using a translation program, this language is known as machine language. It is considered as oldest computer language among all three. Machine language is a low-level language, the input is directly given as binary input (1 and 0 0 form) which is understood and read by a computer system and interpret it easily.
Advantages
- Directly typed and extended.
- Not requiring a translate program.
Disadvantages
- Difficult to remember machine instructions.
- Difficult to understand, modify and debug errors.
- Difficult to remember the address of data and instruction.
- Every instruction is numerical.
Assembly Language
Assembly language is the low-level language for microprocessors, microcontroller, computer and other programmable devices. Assembly language or assembly code is considered as the second-generation language.
Machine language and assembly language are both low-level languages, but assembly language includes human-readable commands like add, sub and mov while machine language does not contain any words or even letters.
Each statement in an assembly language corresponds directly to a machine code understood by the microprocessor. The software needed to convert an assembly code to machine code is called an assembler
Advantages
- Easy to debug.
- Operate efficiently but less efficient than machine code.
- More standardized.
Disadvantages
- The language is not easy to understand.
- Dependant with machine language.
High-level language
It is the programming language that closer to human language than machine language. They are characterised to use common English words as their instruction.
The examples of high-level languages are C, C++, JAVA, ANDROID, FORTRAN, Pascal, Perl, Ruby, and Visual Basic. In C language, the function printf() is used to display the output. The developer can easily write the program and only need is to convert it into machine code.
Advantages
- Easy to write.
- Easy to understand.
- Portable: It can work across different CPU families supports a wide range of data types.
Disadvantages
- Slower than a low-level language.
