Timeline of programming languages
This is a timeline, i.e. a chronology, of historically important programming languages. Other listings of programming languages are:
Legend:
- ( Entry ) means a non-universal programming language
- * <YEAR> means a unique language (no direct predecessor)
| Predecessor(s) | Year | Name | Chief developer, Company |
Pre 1950 | |||
| * | ~1837 | Analytical Engine order code | Charles Babbage |
| * | 1945 | Plankalkül (concept) | Konrad Zuse |
1950s | |||
| * | 1952 | A-0 | Grace Hopper |
| * | 1954 | Mark I Autocode | Tony Brooker |
| A-0 | 1954-1955 | FORTRAN "0" (concept) | John W. Backus at IBM |
| A-0 | 1954 | ARITH-MATIC | Grace Hopper |
| A-0 | 1954 | MATH-MATIC | Grace Hopper |
| * | 1954 | IPL V (concept) | Allen Newell, Cliff Shaw, Herbert Simon |
| A-0 | 1955 | FLOW-MATIC | Grace Hopper |
| IPL | 1956-1958 | LISP (concept) | John McCarthy |
| FLOW-MATIC | 1957 | COMTRAN | Bob Bemer |
| FORTRAN 0 | 1957 | FORTRAN "I" (implementation) | John W. Backus at IBM |
| * | 1957 | COMIT (concept) | |
| FORTRAN I | 1958 | FORTRAN II | John W. Backus at IBM |
| FORTRAN | 1958 | ALGOL 58 (IAL) | International effort |
| * | 1958 | IPL V (implementation) | Allen Newell, Cliff Shaw, Herbert Simon |
| FLOW-MATIC, COMTRAN | 1959 | COBOL (concept) | The Codasyl Committee |
| IPL | 1959 | LISP (implementation) | John McCarthy |
| 1959 | TRAC (concept) | Mooers | |
1960s | |||
| ALGOL 58 | 1960 | ALGOL 60 | |
| FLOW-MATIC, COMTRAN | 1960 | COBOL 61 (implementation) | The Codasyl Committee |
| * | 1961 | COMIT (implementation) | |
| FORTRAN II | 1962 | FORTRAN IV | |
| * | 1962 | APL (concept) | Iverson |
| ALGOL 58 | 1962 | MAD | Arden, et al. |
| ALGOL 60 | 1962 | SIMULA (concept) | |
| FORTRAN II, COMIT | 1962 | SNOBOL | Griswold, et al. |
| ALGOL 60 | 1963 | CPL | Barron, Strachey, et al. |
| SNOBOL | 1963 | SNOBOL3 | Griswold, et al. |
| ALGOL 60 | 1963 | ALGOL 68 (concept) | van Wijngaarden, et al. |
| ALGOL 58 | 1963 | JOSS I | Cliff Shaw, RAND |
| CPL, LISP | 1964 | COWSEL | Burstall, Popplestone |
| ALGOL 60, COBOL, FORTRAN | 1964 | PL/I (concept) | IBM |
| FORTRAN II, JOSS | 1964 | BASIC | Kemeny and Kurtz |
| 1964 | TRAC (implementation) | Mooers | |
| 1964? | IITRAN | ||
| JOSS | 1965 | TELCOMP | BBN |
| JOSS I | 1966 | JOSS II | Chuck Baker, RAND |
| FORTRAN IV | 1966 | FORTRAN 66 | |
| LISP | 1966 | ISWIM | Landin |
| ALGOL 60 | 1966 | CORAL66 | |
| CPL | 1967 | BCPL | Richards |
| FORTRAN, TELCOMP | 1967 | MUMPS | Massachusetts General Hospital |
| * | 1967 | APL (implementation) | Iverson |
| ALGOL 60 | 1967 | SIMULA 67 (implementation) | Dahl, Myhrhaug, Nygaard at Norsk Regnesentral |
| SNOBOL3 | 1967 | SNOBOL4 | Griswold, et al. |
| PL/I | 1967 | XPL | W. M. Mckeeman, et al. at University Of California Santa Cruz, California J. J. Horning, et al. at Stanford University |
| DIBOL | 1968 | DIBOL-8 | DEC |
| COWSEL | 1968 | POP-1 | Burstall, Popplestone |
| 1968 | FORTH (concept) | Moore | |
| LISP | 1968 | LOGO | Papert |
| * | 1968 | REFAL (implementation) | Valentin Turchin |
| ALGOL 60 | 1969 | ALGOL 68 (implementation) | van Wijngaarden, et al. |
| ALGOL 60, COBOL, FORTRAN | 1969 | PL/I (implementation) | IBM |
1970s | |||
| 1970? | FORTH (implementation) | Moore | |
| POP-1 | 1970 | POP-2 | |
| ALGOL 60 | 1971 | Pascal | Wirth, Jensen |
| Pascal, XPL | 1971 | Sue | Holt et al. at University of Toronto |
| SIMULA 67 | 1972 | Smalltalk-72 | Xerox PARC |
| 1972 | PL/M | ||
| B, BCPL, ALGOL 68 | 1972 | C | Ritchie |
| * | 1972 | INTERCAL | |
| 2-level W-Grammar | 1972 | Prolog | Colmerauer |
| Pascal, BASIC | 1973 | COMAL | Christensen, Løfstedt |
| Pascal, Sue | 1973 | LIS | Ichbiah et al. at CII Honeywell Bull |
| BASIC | 1974 | GRASS | DeFanti |
| Business BASIC | 1974 | BASIC FOUR | BASIC FOUR CORPORATION |
| LISP | 1975 | Scheme | Sussman, Steele |
| Pascal | 1975? | Modula | Wirth |
| BASIC | 1975 | Altair BASIC | Gates, Allen |
| ALGOL 68, BLISS, ECL, HAL | 1975 | CS-4 | Brosgol at Intermetrics |
| Smalltalk-72 | 1976 | Smalltalk-76 | Xerox PARC |
| C, FORTRAN | 1976 | Ratfor | Kernighan |
| * | 1977 | FP | John Backus |
| * | 1977 | Bourne Shell (sh) | Bourne |
| Fortran | 1977 | IDL | David Stern of Research Systems Inc |
| MUMPS | 1977 | Standard MUMPS | |
| SNOBOL | 1977 | ICON(concept) | Griswold |
| ALGOL 68, LIS | 1977 | Green | Ichbiah et al. at CII Honeywell Bull for US Dept of Defense |
| ALGOL 68, CS-4 | 1977 | Red | Brosgol et al. at Intermetrics for US Dept of Defense |
| ALGOL 68, | 1977 | Blue | Goodenough et al. at SofTech for US Dept of Defense |
| ALGOL 68, | 1977 | Yellow | Spitzen et al. at SRI International for US Dept of Defense |
| FORTRAN IV | 1978 | FORTRAN 77 | |
| Modula | 1978? | Modula-2 | Wirth |
| * | 1978? | MATLAB | Moler at the University of New Mexico |
| Algol60 | 1978? | SMALL | Brownlee at the University of Auckland |
| * | 1978 | VISICALC | Bricklin, Frankston at VisiCorp |
| PL/I, BASIC, EXEC 2 | 1979 | REXX | Cowlishaw |
| C, SNOBOL | 1979 | Awk | Aho, Weinberger, Kernighan |
| SNOBOL | 1979 | ICON(implementation) | Griswold |
| * | 1979 | Vulcan dBase-II | Ratliff |
1980s | |||
| C, SIMULA 67 | 1980 | C with Classes | Stroustrup |
| Smalltalk-76 | 1980 | Smalltalk-80 | Xerox PARC |
| Smalltalk, C | 1982 | Objective-C | Brad Cox |
| Green | 1983 | Ada 83 | U.S. Department of Defense |
| C with Classes | 1983 | C++ | Stroustrup |
| BASIC | 1983 | True BASIC | Kemeny, Kurtz at Dartmouth College |
| sh | 1984? | Korn Shell (ksh) | Dave Korn |
| * | 1984 | Standard ML | |
| dBase | 1984 | CLIPPER | Nantucket |
| LISP | 1984 | Common Lisp | Guy Steele and many others |
| 1977MUMPS | 1985 | 1984 MUMPS | |
| dBase | 1985 | PARADOX | Borland |
| Interpress | 1985 | PostScript | Warnock |
| BASIC | 1985 | QuickBASIC | Microsoft |
| 1986 | Miranda | David Turner at University of Kent | |
| 1986 | LabVIEW | National Instruments | |
| SIMULA 67 | 1986 | Eiffel | Meyer |
| 1986 | Informix-4GL | Informix | |
| C | 1986 | PROMAL | |
| Smalltalk | 1987 | Self (concept) | Sun Microsystems Inc. |
| * | 1987 | HyperTalk | Apple |
| * | 1987 | SQL-87 | |
| C, sed, awk, sh | 1987 | Perl | Wall |
| MATLAB | 1988 | Octave | |
| dBase-III | 1988 | dBase-IV | |
| Awk, Lisp | 1988 | Tcl | Ousterhout |
| REXX | 1988 | Object REXX | Simon Nash |
| Ada | 1988 | SPARK | Bernard A. Carré |
| Turbo Pascal | 1989 | Turbo Pascal OOP | Borland |
| C | 1989 | Standard C89/90 | ANSI X3.159-1989 (adopted by ISO in 1990) |
| Modula-2 | 1989 | Modula-3 | Cardeli, et al. |
| Modula-2 | 1989 | Oberon | Wirth |
1990s | |||
| Oberon | 1990 | Object Oberon | Wirth |
| APL, FP | 1990 | J | Iverson, R. Hui at Iverson Software |
| Miranda | 1990 | Haskell | |
| 1984 MUMPS | 1990 | 1990 MUMPS | |
| Fortran 77 | 1991 | Fortran 90 | |
| Object Oberon | 1991 | Oberon-2 | Wirth |
| ABC | 1991 | Python | Van Rossum |
| 1991 | Q | ||
| QuickBASIC | 1991 | Visual Basic | Alan Cooper at Microsoft |
| SQL-87 | 1992 | SQL-92 | |
| Turbo Pascal OOP | 1992 | Borland Pascal | |
| ICI | 1992 | Tim Long | |
| ksh | 1993? | Z Shell (zsh) | |
| Smalltalk | 1993? | Self (implementation) | Sun Microsystems Inc. |
| Forth | 1993 | FALSE | Oortmerrsen |
| FALSE | 1993 | Brainfuck | Müller |
| HyperTalk | 1993 | Revolution Transcript | |
| HyperTalk | 1993 | AppleScript | Apple |
| APL, Lisp | 1993 | K | Whitney |
| Smalltalk, Perl | 1993 | Ruby | |
| 1993 | Lua | Roberto Ierusalimschy et al. at Tecgraf, PUC-Rio | |
| C | 1993 | ZPL | Chamberlain et al. at University of Washington |
| Lisp | 1994 | Dylan | many people at Apple Computer |
| Ada 83 | 1995 | Ada 95 | ISO |
| Borland Pascal | 1995 | Delphi | Anders Hejlsberg at Borland |
| 1995 | ColdFusion | Allaire | |
| C, SIMULA67 OR C++, Smalltalk | 1995 | Java | James Gosling at Sun Microsystems |
| 1990MUMPS | 1995 | 1995 MUMPS | |
| Self, Java | 1995? | LiveScript | Brendan Eich atNetscape |
| Fortran 90 | 1996 | Fortran 95 | |
| APL, Perl | 1996 | Perl Data Language (PDL) | Karl Glazebrook, Jarle Brinchmann, Tuomas Lukka, and Christian Soeller |
| REXX | 1996 | NetRexx | Cowlishaw |
| LiveScript | 1997? | JavaScript | Brendan Eich at Netscape |
| SML 84 | 1997 | SML 97 | |
| PHP 3 | 1997 | PHP | |
| Scheme | 1997 | Pico | Free University of Brussels |
| Smalltalk-80, Self | 1997 | Squeak Smalltalk | Alan Kay, et al. at Apple Computer |
| JavaScript | 1997? | ECMAScript | ECMA TC39-TG1 |
| C++, Standard C | 1998 | Standard C++ | ANSI/ISO Standard C++ |
| Prolog | 1998 | Erlang | Open Source Erlang at Ericsson |
| Standard C89/90 | 1999 | Standard C99 | ISO/IEC 9899:1999 |
2000s | |||
| C, C++ | 2000 | D | Walter Bright at Digital Mars |
| C, C++, Delphi, Java | 2000 | C# | Anders Hejlsberg at Microsoft(ECMA) |