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Concept
Comparison of programming languages (syntax)
Summary
This comparison of programming languages compares the features of language syntax (format) for over 50 computer programming languages.
Programming language expressions can be broadly classified into four syntax structures:
prefix notation
Lisp (* (+ 2 3) (expt 4 5))
infix notation
Fortran (2 + 3) * (4 ** 5)
suffix, postfix, or Reverse Polish notation
Forth 2 3 + 4 5 ** *
math-like notation
TUTOR (2 + 3)(45) $$ note implicit multiply operator
When a programming languages has statements, they typically have conventions for:
statement separators;
statement terminators; and
line continuation
A statement separator demarcates the boundary between two separate statements. A statement terminator defines the end of an individual statement. Languages that interpret the end of line to be the end of a statement are called "line-oriented" languages.
"Line continuation" is a convention in line-oriented languages where the newline character could potentially be misinterpreted as a statement terminator. In such languages, it allows a single statement to span more than just one line.
Line continuation is generally done as part of lexical analysis: a newline normally results in a token being added to the token stream, unless line continuation is detected.
Whitespace – Languages that do not need continuations
Ada – Lines terminate with semicolon
C# – Lines terminate with semicolon
JavaScript – Lines terminate with semicolon (which may be inferred)
Lua
OCaml
Ampersand as last character of line
Fortran 90, Fortran 95, Fortran 2003, Fortran 2008
Backslash as last character of line
bash and other Unix shells
C and C++ preprocessor
Mathematica and Wolfram Language
Python
Ruby
JavaScript – only within single- or double-quoted strings
Backtick as last character of line
PowerShell
Hyphen as last character of line
SQL*Plus
Underscore as last character of line
AutoIt
Cobra
Visual Basic
Xojo
Ellipsis (as three periods–not one special character)
MATLAB: The ellipsis token need not be the last characters on the line, but any following it will be ignored.
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