What language to use to code applications?

Hello all!

I'm currently looking for an alternative to bmx maxgui (cross-platform prefered). - What language would you suggest?

Thanks in advance.
Grisu

I'm using Python to build the editor for my game.
It's working pretty well. Nice and tidy, easily cross platform, and very well respected.

I ended up using Python instead of BlitzMax for this one because I really like its GTK / Glade bindings (and I want to play with Python).

It's well worth a try. Just about the only universally accepted language build specifically to be easy. It is a scripting language, but some interpreters do just-in-time compiling, which is pretty cool, and it's more than fast enough unless you plan to do a graphics intensive game.
(Besides, the features available by it being a scripting language, such as easy extensibility, more than make up for that).

The one you're most experienced using? Python, Java, C#, take your pick!

Fed up with waiting for Axe.Win32MaxGUI development, Grisu? :-\

It's rather hard to make a suggestion when one does not know what project we are talking about. There is also the question of --why-- you need an alternative to BlitzMax & MaxGUI.

The only thing that really seems to work on all platforms: wxPython.

If cross-platform in your case stands for Windows and Linux only, and if you can accept using a design-by-committee-curly braces language, Mono C# is also a good choice.

Or you could use IronPython on the Mono Framework. The GUI-part will also only work nicely on Windows and Linux, but you would not have to use a curly braces language.

I will not recommend Java. Too complex, and applications still don't look truely native anywhere. But if you want to target the Java runtime anyway, you could use Jython.

Now let me think... Didn't all my suggestions ultimately lead to a flavour of Python? ;-)

If you need good literature on Python, here are four must-reads:
Mark Lutz & David Ascher, "Learning Python", O'Reilly
Mark Lutz, "Programming Python", O'Reilly
Noel Rappin & Robin Dunn, "wxPython in action", Manning
Sean Riley, "Game Programming with Python", Charles River Media

PureBasic

c++, probably move to .NET soon

Java (I prefer VB.NET, but it is not cross platform)

PureBasic +1....

Usually VB 6.0, may move on to .Net 2005 once I start getting less annoyed by that structure. I do use BMax/B3D when it's necessary (mainly for graphical apps, or games).

Not sure about cross-platform, but I use C# for windows GUIs, and it's very easy to use.

For cross platform applications REALbasic (Pro) is excellent. Requires next-to-no knowledge to throw together a simple app (well, it's BASIC, how hard can it be?), is OOP, and apps run the *same* on all the platforms.

A little expensive, but I thought it was money well spent.

Used to use it a lot before BlitzMax came out... but now I'm a BlitzMax junky. I just prefer the BlitzMax environment. And MaxGUI works great for me - especially on Mac and Linux.

I guess it all depends what you want to do.

Interesting, Brucey. I never got used to the development style REALbasic imposes on the user. I especially dislike that one just cannot see the entire source code, but only one procedure/function/method at a time by clicking it in the project treeview. The GUI designer is very nice, though, and REALbasic Pro also has a very rich featureset and decent third party support. And yet, language-wise it does not come anywhere near BlitzMax.

Well, I'm sort of wondering if I should really be getting back into Delphi. To me, that was a solid next-gen version of Pascal, adding in OOP elements to really make that language come to life. If only I'd remember what types of apps I made in there now... Been at least 5, maybe 10 years since I've ever used that one.

After using Lisp for a while, I miss it. I just wish there were more libraries or even better, a Blitz-esque engine written in Lisp.

SOS: Look into Python. It has all the strengths of Lisp, and none of the weaknesses/stigmata, depending on your perspective.

I will be looking into it for the future.

It still misses Lisp's ultimate strength, imo, which is the ability to transform the language at will prior to compilation via macro's (i.e. you have the full power of the language/compiler to use as a preprocessor, to add new control constructs, etc), but I know Python has a lot more support and a much larger userbase and far more game oriented libraries available to it.

I suppose one other advantage to Lisp is it's greater execution speed (especially optimized Lisp code). Of course, for the game projects I'm planning - outside of my souped up graphical MUD, that really shouldn't be necessary. Same thing with macro's - they are nice but outside of AI programming or other exotic domains it's not necessary by any means.

How does Ruby compare to Python, in your opinion FlameDuck? I know Ruby has a lot of Lisp'esque qualities but have never given it more than a cursory glance.

Me neither. I suppose it depends on what you're looking for in a language really. From my understanding Python is the most "generic" language of the three, so has wider areas of application, and as you mentioned it has bindings for just about any type of technology you can shake a stick at.

The downside is that speed isn't the best in the world, but this can be rectified somewhat by using C for speed critical parts, or using a Python compiler like Psyco.

C#

vb.net

c# or vb.net... or maybe iron python o_O

Java + jMonkeyEngine

C# here too.