Task: Learning Journal

Open your Learning Journal by clicking on the image below

Good notes will help you organise and process data and information

High Level Languages

High level languages are written so that they are as close to our human language as they can be, allowing the programmer to focus on the problem to be solved.

You do not need any real understanding of the hardware to use a high level language as they are not tied to a particular computer or CPU

High level languages have to be converted to the language the computer understands, machine code, before they can be run. This process is either interpreting or compiling, depending on the high level language used

Examples include: Javascript, Python, Visual Basic, C++, Java.

Advantages:

• Easier to modify as it uses English like statements
• Easier/faster to write code as it uses English like statements
• Easier to debug during development due to English like statements
• Portable code – not designed to run on just one type of machine

Low Level Languages

Low level languages are used to write programs that relate to the specific architecture and hardware of a particular type of computer.

They are closer to the native language of a computer (binary), making them harder for programmers to understand.

Examples of low level languages:

• Assembly Language
• Machine Code

Assembly Language

Not many programs are written using assembly language, it does tend to be used when dealing with hardware items like when creating device drivers or on embedded systems.

It is easy to distinguish it from a high level language as it contains short mnemonic code words rather than standard english words.

Advantages

• Can make use of special hardware or special machine-dependent instructions
• Translated program requires less memory
• Write code that can be executed faster
• Can work directly on memory locations

Machine Code

Programmers rarely if ever use machine code (binary) as it is very difficult to understand.

Task:

Open your student workbook at page 25 Read through the notes then complete the following tasks in your book.

1. Task 14

When you are finished screenshot your answer into your Learning Journal