language interpreters/ interpreted languages weaknesses?

[Skip Montanaro]

    WT> Java's not interpreted, though -- I've never seen ANY Java
    WT> interpreter.  Java is always compiled, usually to bytecode, and then
    WT> the bytecode machine is emulated.

Same for Python and Perl.  It's just that you never see Perl's byte code
(it's compiled each time you run your script and discarded at the end of the
run) and compilation of Python to bytecode is done automatically, though the
results are saved for reuse in later runs in a .pyc or .pyo (optimized)
file.  The only thing that makes Java "more compiled" than Python or Perl is
that you have to explicitly run a separate compiler over the source to
create a .class file.  Also, Java byte codes can be compiled "just in time"
to native instructions by the Java virtual machine.  I'm not aware that this
has been done on a large scale for either Python or Perl, though there have
been attempts of various kinds for both languages.

So, aside from the differences in how you get from source to running
program, depending on your definitions, they can all be called compiled or
interpreted languages.

Skip Montanaro | http://www.mojam.com/
skip at mojam.com | http://www.musi-cal.com/~skip/
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