As the title says: what's the simplest programming language you ever used? ...like if you switched around in the first place?

gotta be C

I don't program but I make games in Stencyl and it is super easy

Scratch is technically a programming language so I would say that.

The simplest one I've used has gotta be ActionScript 1, with Python coming in a close second. I say Python because I've helped teach people programming via Python, but I also put AS1 over Python because I already knew how to program when I learned Python, so I had the benefit of prior experience when learning it -- whereas I learned programming in AS1 from scratch. Well, I wouldn't call it active learning so much as passive learning - just copied, pasted and tweaked code until I picked up the different parts of the language.

And that brings me to my second reason why AS1 is "easier" than Python - beginners are often turned away by compiler and runtime errors. They see an error that (to experienced programmers) can be easily fixed by following the steps that the error message outlines, and their brain shuts down because they've broken something, and that can dissuade them from proceeding further.

However, in AS1 there are pretty much no errors - you make a mistake, it just silently fails! It's extremely infuriating when you're an experienced programmer (because there are a LOT of pitfalls that you may unknowingly fall into) but it's VERY good as a beginner because you're not being scolded by the compiler!

Meanwhile in Python, you can get errors from indentation - and this can be enough to turn away people if they don't have a guide. Python is indeed the simplest language for many to learn, but for the "timid" it could pose a challenge. Unfortunately, error handling has to be present in some capacity because Python is actually intended to be a usable language for everyone, not just beginners.

If programming languages were like genies, AS1 would be like the djinn that doesn't care whether your wishes will lead to terrible side effects, or outright don't work - it just carries them out. Meanwhile other languages (Python included) would at the very least ask you "Are you sure about that?".

Javascript

Free coding courses

For me it is python, because this is the langage that learn me the way of thinking while programming. And even today, even After all the different langage that I have learn (kotlin, golang, JS, PHP,...), Python still learn some New shortcut. And it Can handle si much error alone that when you come back to python after some year, it feels weird.

But it's true, that the string logic of JS miss me a bit!

Learning to programm with JS should bé hell, with those damn function who turn into a class!

Unix shell. Aka bash or zsh or ksh.

Javascript is the simplest, I love the C langs even though I have the most practice with Javascript (mostly because I can code in Javascript while on my lunch break at work) I have to say.

Gotta be Visual Basic man, that shit is easier than english itself >:)

lemme see if I know all C keywords by heart!

1. do
2. while
3. for
4. if
5. else
6. switch
7. break
8. continue
9. goto
10. static
11. inline
12. const
13. extern
14. restrict
15. volatile
16. _Thread_local
17. auto
18. register
19. sizeof
20. return
21. _Generic
22. _Static_assert
23. struct
24. union
25. enum
26. _Noreturn

lemme check out... wow, looks like I forgot some almost half!

1. case
2. char
3. default
4. double
5. float
6. int
7. long
8. short
9. signed
10. typedef
11. unsigned
12. void
13. _Alignas
14. _Alignof
15. _Atomic
16. _Bool
17. _Complex
18. _Imaginary

mostly primitives types... dummy me! so in total: 44 keyword for C

I have not read C23 spec yet... they might have introduced new things

I doubt any of these would be "the simplest language"

all shell scripting is an horrendous mess built over decades of necessities materialized in undiscriminated extensions to an exhausted grammar, accumulating all possible obnoxious of errors and kludges as excuses to "fixes"

shell was not planned. it is an accident, and widely available, and widely used. it's hell. but it's familiar, and has a legacy

but who am I, right? give me time, I'll quote some shell gurus who claim this themselves

brainfuck

python

Assembly or Binary

Actual BASIC? It doesn't get much simpler than Tiny BASIC.

Well, excluding novel languages that are invented to be ridiculously simple in terms of syntax...

Of the ones I've learned, I'd say Javascript and Python. Python is great for calculations, control, and GUIs (in my offline applications anyway). Javascript writes just like C++, but it is much looser in terms of datatypes and such. You are pretty much confined to web apps though, which, by the way, can't really be protected in terms of IP: Your code is always visible. Otherwise it is a very powerful language.

By simple you might mean not incorporating "modern" tools like classes...but honestly learning classes makes things a lot easier in the long run. What an invention.

Not the initial topic but one of the languages I think is more difficult is C#. Is that ironic? It seems like C++ but it is strangely strict on certain things, like what datatypes you can pass to a function.

Lua

it's certainly the least ambiguous language.

C or Python, depending on what you mean by "simple"

Scratch probably, if that counts as a programming language

If not, HTML must be the simpliest i've known

No, i think urboWarp is better then Scratch, bcause:

Turbowarp allow custom extensions + custom blocks (including newgrounds.io API), etc.

HTML is not an programming language, its an markup language. But PHP is an programming language.

Adding extensions and custom APIs and what not would make Scratch more advanced but also less simple. This was about what is the simplest programming language and Scratch takes the cake on that category.

action scriot 1, little is known about it but it is very easy

Haxe

Scratch if that even counts.

Simple in which way?

Javascript has gotta be pretty 'simple' as far as overhead and execution, but the syntax is nigh unreadable.

Lua is far more readable and has a similar pace as far as programming speed goes, but typically needs a fair bit more in terms of libraries to do anything fun.

It closer resembles and acts like human language, rather than being raw code to decipher

You'll love Objective C.