The software environment was written in PowerBuilder and COBOL, which was generated by a fourth generation language code generator (4GL).
With the creation of an efficient higher-level (or natural) language, also known as a third-generation language, computer programming moved beyond a small coterie to include engineers and scientists, who were instrumental in expanding the use of computers.
Fourth-generation language (4GL), Fourth-generation computer programming language.
Previous programming was written in machine (first-generation) language or assembly (second-generation) language, which required the programmer to write instructions in binary or hexadecimal arithmetic.
This proliferation of incompatible specialized languages spurred an interest in the United States and Europe to create a single "second-generation" language.
Unlike first- and second-generation languages, the syntax (ie, the rules for combining symbols and words) of third-generation languages is in principle independent of the computer they run on.
First-generation languages talked to the computer in the ones and zeros of "machine code", which was interpreted directly by its central processor as instructions for manipulating data stored in its memory.
A separate program called a compiler is used to translate the code into machine language.A further abstraction is achieved in fourth-generation languages such as SQL (Structured Query Language), a programming language for querying databases, or Mathematica and MathCad, languages for performing advanced mathematical manipulations and solving scientific problems.
Even into the second or third generation, we speak different languages -- more languages, often, than we know we know.
They are intended to be easier for users than machine languages (first-generation), assembly languages (second-generation), and older high-level languages (third-generation).
The APT system uses a fifth-generation prototyping language to model the communication structure, timing constraints, I/O control, and data buffering that comprise the requirements for an embedded software system.
