The next group of languages allowed the programmer to work at a more conceptual level. There are currently over 2000 computer languages. In the next several weeks we will study a dialect of Scheme which can be used to write applets. For example, lets see how to write, compile, and run a simple C program. This file contains machine language.
Lets look more closely at what is happening here.
The operating system then lets another program run for a few milliseconds. Also, when every your program needs to write to the screen, it gives the data that needs to be displayed to the operating system which then takes control of the CPU and displays the data. An interpreter takes a different approach. In this class we will be writing Scheme programs which are run by a Scheme interpreter written in Java. Compilers and interpreters are usually themselves written in a high level language.