languages of choice n.
[C], [C++], [LISP], and [Perl]. Nearly every hacker knows one of C or LISP, and most good ones are fluent in both. C++, despite some serious drawbacks, is generally preferred to other object-oriented languages (though in 1999 it looks as though [Java] has displaced it in the affections of hackers, if not everywhere). Since around 1990 Perl has rapidly been gaining favor, especially as a tool for systems-administration utilities and rapid prototyping. [Python], Smalltalk and Prolog are also popular in small but influential communities.
There is also a rapidly dwindling category of older hackers with FORTRAN, or even assembler, as their language of choice. They often prefer to be known as [Real Programmer]s, and other hackers consider them a bit odd (see "[The Story of Mel]" in Appendix A). Assembler is generally no longer considered interesting or appropriate for anything but [HLL] implementation, [glue], and a few time-critical and hardware-specific uses in systems programs. FORTRAN occupies a shrinking niche in scientific programming.
Most hackers tend to frown on languages like [Pascal] and [Ada], which don't give them the near-total freedom considered necessary for hacking (see [bondage-and-discipline language]), and to regard everything even remotely connected with [COBOL] or other traditional [card walloper] languages as a total and unmitigated [loss].
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