I&#x27;ve spent time learning Python, R, Matlab, and a few of the traditional languages (C, Fortran, a few others. However, I&#x27;m no kind of language expert by any means! One thing that has confused me while learning languages is that while the conceptual ideas of a language, like control flow, stay the same between languages, syntax is varied and changes a lot.<p>I see the amount of effort that goes into development of languages and am surprised at the duplication effort that is required.<p>Will we ever arrive to a point where syntax between languages is constant, and the compiler is what changes? Where a computer science course can point to an example of a while statement--and that while statement is valid anywhere?
Ask HN: Why does programming language syntax vary?