
Graph of Programming Language Influences - elwell
http://bgriffen.scripts.mit.edu/www/2014/01/graphs-of-wikipedia-programming-languages-and-paradigms/
======
torrance
It's really interesting that Haskell, which is often portrayed as merely an
academic play-thing, is so prominent. By bringing together so many language
features that were otherwise relatively obscure it's acted as a kind of
language laboratory — and in doing so it's made a really clear case for a lot
of them.

~~~
tikhonj
It's a language designer's language--just like jazz is often musician's music
:).

Haskell serves as both a vessel and a showcase for PL research. It also has
very close ties to a bunch of communities, including many of the people behind
Microsoft's languages (VB.NET, C# and F#).

Also, while Haskell does not have a broad _presence_ in industry, it does have
a reasonable amount of _mindshare_. A surprising number of people know and
talk about Haskell, even if they've never used it. This also helps influence
the design of other languages.

~~~
tethis
I know I like to talk about Haskell, even if it's too dense for me to grasp at
a level where I could put it into production without jumping off a bridge.

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captaincrowbar
It seems a bit odd that Javascript and Ecmascript landed in two very different
parts of the graph.

~~~
blueskin_
...I just read that as EczemaScript.

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frik
This graph needs a clean up and there should be arrows.

Basic and QBasic/QuickBasic are on two different parts of the graph, as well
as Javascript and Ecmascript.

The should be interactive and force-based so that it aligns in a nicer way.

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mutagen
Looks like some careful editing of Wikipedia pages would clean this up
immensely, the various isolates strands of BASIC stood out to me.

~~~
mattdw
Not to mention that it's just repeating whatever myths Wikipedia has picked
up, like the connection of Javascript to Scheme. A more rigorously curated
graph would be very interesting.

~~~
midas007
So I've had this one under construction for a while:

It's handmade, so it's better but not perfect:

[https://app.box.com/s/lo36pbyqi3v2fg1wqefx](https://app.box.com/s/lo36pbyqi3v2fg1wqefx)
[Language Family Tree.svg]

[https://app.box.com/s/qxq4ohxfv44j3euas5gl](https://app.box.com/s/qxq4ohxfv44j3euas5gl)
[Language Family Tree.graffle]

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cormullion
I thought that AppleScript looked oddly placed, sheltering directly under
Lisp. But some people do consider it to be influenced by Lisp/Scheme - Matt
Neuburg proposes the connection somewhere in his 'AppleScript - the definitive
guide'. I would have connected it more with HyperTalk, which is down past
ECMAscript. And English.

~~~
lispm
> AppleScript was officially conceived in 1989 as a research project by the
> Advanced Technology Group (ATG) at Apple Computer and was code-named “Family
> Farm.” The research team was led by Larry Tesler and included Mike Farr,
> Mitchell Gass, Mike Gough, Jed Harris, Al Hoffman, Ruben Kleiman, Edmund
> Lai, and Frank Ludolph.

Some of those knew Lisp. The Advanced Technology Group led by Tesler used
Macintosh Common Lisp in many application prototypes and research projects.
There was an 'AppleScript on Steroids' written in MCL called Sk8Script by
them.

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CCs
The image itself: [http://bgriffen.scripts.mit.edu/www/wp-
content/uploads/2014/...](http://bgriffen.scripts.mit.edu/www/wp-
content/uploads/2014/01/programminglanguages-label.png)

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sdegutis
Why is Sing# out there by itself? It's a direct descendent of C#.

~~~
mindcrime
Looks like it's because the connection between C# and Sing# isn't noted in the
"Influenced By" field in the infobox.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sing_Sharp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sing_Sharp)

------
cafard
See also
[http://oreilly.com/news/languageposter_0504.html](http://oreilly.com/news/languageposter_0504.html)

------
informatimago
[http://www.levenez.com/lang/](http://www.levenez.com/lang/) looks much much
more exhaustive.

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elwell
CoffeeScript is in an interesting place.

~~~
platz
right next to the oddly placed c++11

~~~
cobbal
Which was in no way influenced by c++

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camus2
would be more interesting if it were interactive. Right not it's barely
readable.

~~~
yaph
A while ago I created an interactive version of programming languages
influence, see it at [http://exploringdata.github.io/vis/programming-
languages-inf...](http://exploringdata.github.io/vis/programming-languages-
influence-network/)

It is based on Freebase data, which differs from DBpedia, although it is one
of Freebase's sources.

------
midas007
Erlang is missing.

~~~
elwell
Maybe it doesn't have any influence(s).

~~~
midas007
Nope. It is heavily influenced by Prolog.

And it influenced Scala, Go and many more.

