I was recently listening to a Spaghetti Code Podcast with host Jeff Brand and guest Jason Bock, a Microsoft C# MVP. These two blokes were talking about languages, from (classic) VB to C++ to Java to C# and F#. And their discussion took me down memory lane. Oh, and it inspired me to write a quick little post about the podcast.

Spaghetti Code Podcast
First, what is this podcast, and why am I mentioning it. Well, Spaghetti Code Podcast is a series of audio podcasts with host Jeff Brand, a Developer Evangelist on my team, and various guests from around Jeff's stomping grounds in Minneapolis, MN. He's played host to Rocky Lhotka, Shannon Braun, Matt Milner, Scott Colestock, and others. You can get his podcast on iTunes or from his RSS feed. And if you listen to the latest podcast, a recap of MIX with Rocky and Shannon, be sure to stay around for the ender. I was rolling on the floor laughing. Jeff's a hoot!

Memory Lane
Listening to this podcast took me down memory lane. Well, actually, what triggered this trip down that dusty old road was a question from Jeff. He basically asked "What languages have you programmed in, Jason?" And that was all it took to get me thinking, especially when Jason talked about programming a text-based Zork-like adventure game in BASIC on an Apple II way back in high school.

I started thinking of all the languages I have used at one time or another. Like Jason, I started with BASIC, but I used an IBM PC in 1986 and I wrote two programs. The first was a text-based take on Space Invaders. The second was to code in a string of HEX code I found that played a 10-second clip of "Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting". (Tip: the IBM PC sucked for sound. To get it right, I rewrote it on Commodore 64 and, later, the Amiga. Amazing mono audio!)

As I moved on from BASIC, I started thinking about all the programming languages I learned, and for an added challenge I started listing them in the order I learned them and where I learned them.

Well, the list started to become a bit lengthy. I decided to not include scripting languages. Two reasons. One, I'm not terribly good at them. (Yes, I can muddle through JavaScript, and I am passable at VBScript.) Two, the list is long enough. I also decided to keep it strictly to languages, so no frameworks or supporting libraries like the data access soup of the late 1990s (ODBC, OLEDB, ADO, JDBC, JDO, and ADO.NET).

Admittedly I did include multiple versions of COBOL and VB, and I added one UI "framework" in CICS. I think of them more as career milestones — or particularly painful consulting engagements. But I digress...

A Renaissance Programmer
Why the lengthy list? Truthfully it's partly a reminder of where I came from over the past nearly 20 years. Though it is a pointed example of how easily one can learn a variety of languages. Part of what reminded me of that was a quote Jason referenced during his interview, and I am paraphrasing here, "Once you make a habit of learning languages, they become easier and easier to learn."

There is great truth in that, and I believe it whole-heartedly. Were there programming languages that I found difficult? Oh, yes, Assembly was a killer course, and Prolog wrapped me around the axle. But I also found that over time learning various languages became easier and easier. Sure there are quirks with certain languages. I've looked at Ruby and Python and F#. There are unique traits about each.

But you know what? There are common elements, too. Conditional logic looks not that dissimilar between various languages. Variable declaration is often recognizable. And with the "big languages", there is more in common than different.

VB.NET, C#, and Java are all incredibly similar in core syntax. Sure, one has begin-end blocks, and another requires a strong pinky finger... I mean, uses curly braces and semicolons. But if you look beyond the core dialect of the languages and consider how each language tackles variable declaration, conditional logic, method invocation, there are many similarities. The crux of a language, really, is the underlying frameworks and libraries you're going to be using.

Favorite Things
One of the questions Jeff asked during his interview was "What is your favorite language feature?" I won't spoil Jason's answers — you need to listen to the podcast for that — but it got me thinking about my favorite language features. Now, I'm not talking about tools like Visual Studio, or class libraries. I'm talking about capabilities built into the language.

My all-time favorite? Smalltalk's code blocks capability. You could literally read syntax from a database, pass it into a method signature, and have the method execute the code you read from the database at runtime. It was cool, and this capability enabled us to do some neat things. Second to that was Smalltalk's ability to change the core language behaviors in code. On a lark, a co-worker and I pulled a prank on one of our colleagues who, regrettably, forgot to lock his computer. We reprogrammed integer to only accept odd numbers. Trust me, that's fun times for a geek.

Other favorites include declaring throws in Java, rewriting memory be branching registers in Assembly (for more fun times, geek-style, try burping out some executable code into executing program memory space; it's a sure-fire way to cause some major heartburn for mainframe operators), and — occasionally — leveraging VB's late binding behavior, especially when programming against the Office object model.

What Language Are You?
Now, back to the original question...

For me, I prefer the VB syntax. Perhaps it was years of COBOL and VB programming. Perhaps I just have a weak pinky finger. But I have an affinity for VB, so I code in VB, I present in VB, and I demo in VB. I occasionally work in C#, too, and I am often forced to deal with JavaScript. But for most things I prefer VB. Including my certifications. And that's the language I am.

So... What language are you? Let me know.