What Makes a Good Programming Language ?

A useful programming language need not possess the qualitie s that may make it a good programming language. Experience suggests that a programming language is good if it helps us write programs which are easy to read, easy to understand, and easy to modify. Thes e requirements – which can only be expressed intuitively rather that defined formally – arise d ir ctly in response to the first two of the three fundamental requirements of software : reliability, maint ability, and efficiency. In this chapter, we look at the qualities that help a programming language meet t he requirements of a good language.