Scripting vs. whatever, again (was Re: Long Live Python!)

[Alex Martelli]

"Grant Edwards" <grante at visi.com> wrote in message
news:H6D37.14720$B7.2683686 at ruti.visi.com...
    ...
> >> I interpret "scripting" as automating a series of operations
> >> that would probably be done interactively by a user otherwise.
    ...
> Probably not.  To add to my "definition", I guess I would call
> it a script if it was done using the same set of "primitives"
> that the user would have done had it been done interactively.
> Primitives like the "ls" "find" "rm" executables found on Unix
> systems.

So you wouldn't "call a script" a script scripted in VBScript
on the Windows Scripting Host, or a script scripted in JScript or
Javascript, residing typically between <SCRIPT> and </SCRIPT>
tags in an HTML page?  Because, while they may well be automating
a series of operations that would be done interactively by a
user, they don't generally do so "using the same set of
primitives" the interactive user would interactively use
(mostly mouseclics on menuitems, buttons &c, with perhaps a
few keystrokes thrown in for good measure)?

And yet the names of the languages, of the supporting tools,
of the relevant tags, &c, clearly indicate that these things
ARE perceived as scripts very widely today.  And I concur
with the general perception which I think these naming choices
indicate.  Interactively-used "primitives" today are mostly
mouseclics on controls & menuitems, but that doesn't make
scripts impossible or inappropriate: on the contrary, scripts
are more and more pervasive -- they just use different and
more appropriate primitives, organized in "object-models" such
as HTML's Document Object Model (DOM), the object-models that
WSH exposes for the Windows Shell, filesystem, &c, and so on.


Alex