Could it be used to create a functional programming language, easily understood by non-programmers or beginners , so they too could take a program and adapt it to their needs ? Does such language exist ?
That's why Excel works for so many people -- the internal and intermediate states can be as visible as the user needs or desires them to be. And those users seem to have no problem chaining together multiple cells into what is essentially a very complex function.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joy_(programming_language)
(Shameless plug for my own implementation: http://joypy.osdn.io/)
I don't know, but I'll try.
It's simple, small, and fun.
First, everything about it is simpler than most other languages. (It may be the simplest useful language, e.g. "Brainf*ck" is simpler but impractical.)
Second, there are many small basis sets of functions that provide Turing-completeness. Meaning that you only have to master a few functions to be able to build any possible function.
Third, developing code in Joy is very like a simple puzzle-solving game, it's very fun.
I may be teaching it to non-programmers in a kind of seminar or course soon, so if you are really interested in real-world data please check back on the Thun site in a month or two. Feel free to get in contact with me through that site as well.
They're claiming to get good results teaching young people a number of important topics, including coding. They're also either using Pyret or planning to use it.
> Math should be taught in prefix notation if u ask me.
Perhaps it should, but it's not.
Or was this whole post sarcasm, and it was done so well that I missed it?
EDIT: After some googling, TIL humblebragging.