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I was going to give the green tick mark to the winning submission of this challenge, but I am unsure what to do. The shortest submission is this, which claims to use "Windows language", but I doubt that Windows can be considered a language.

What do you think? I know our official definition of programming language, but I don't see if/how it allows or rules out "Windows" as a language.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ If anything, I'd say that Windows is an interpreter. We don't go around calling "gcc" a language... \$\endgroup\$
    – AdmBorkBork
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:42
  • \$\begingroup\$ @AdmBorkBork I think that argument may not be valid. We do define languages by their implementations. So there's "GCC C", "TCC C", etc \$\endgroup\$
    – Luis Mendo
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:45
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    \$\begingroup\$ And what language is being implemented by windows. \$\endgroup\$
    – fəˈnɛtɪk
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:45
  • \$\begingroup\$ @fəˈnɛtɪk That's a better argument \$\endgroup\$
    – Luis Mendo
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:46
  • \$\begingroup\$ Yeah, that's a better way of phrasing what I was intending. \$\endgroup\$
    – AdmBorkBork
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:50
  • \$\begingroup\$ @AdmBorkBork Your wording was fine. I got confused because I thought GCC was a C compiler. Now I see it includes many languages \$\endgroup\$
    – Luis Mendo
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:52
  • \$\begingroup\$ @fəˈnɛtɪk Batch \$\endgroup\$
    – Pavel
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:57
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    \$\begingroup\$ @ГригорийПерельман I don't believe that printscreen is a valid batch command. Want to try again? \$\endgroup\$
    – fəˈnɛtɪk
    Mar 17, 2017 at 22:59

1 Answer 1

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If we allow "Windows" as a programming language on the basis that it contains a shell, why not allow "Computer" as a programming language on the basis that you can run an OS with a shell on it? And then the whole question of what is or isn't a programming language becomes moot, because if it can form part of a system which includes a computer then it's ok...

So no, it's absurd to claim that Windows is a language.

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    \$\begingroup\$ I have a computer, so that makes me a programming language, right? \$\endgroup\$
    – mbomb007
    Mar 21, 2017 at 16:14
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    \$\begingroup\$ @mbomb007, exactly. \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Mar 21, 2017 at 16:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ Aren't exe files what makes windows a language? It contains commands that windows parses and executes. (I agree though, that keyboard shortcuts isn't an "input" to windows) \$\endgroup\$
    – Nathan Merrill
    Mar 21, 2017 at 18:27
  • \$\begingroup\$ @NathanMerrill Windows doesn't do anything besides loading the executable and any libraries it needs. Your processor does the actual computation. The machine language is the actual programming language here - Windows and your processor are the tools used to execute the program. When writing a C program, you wouldn't consider bash to be the programming language, but it is a tool you use to compile, link, and execute the program. \$\endgroup\$
    – user45941
    Mar 22, 2017 at 3:22

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