Comparison of programming paradigms

Posted 2020-10-20 zzfx

Main paradigm approaches[edit]

The following are widely considered the main programming paradigms, as seen when measuring programming language popularity. There is some overlap between paradigms, inevitably, but the main features or identifiable differences are summarized in this table:

• Imperative programming – defines computation as statements that change a program state.
• Procedural programming, structured programming – specifies the steps a program must take to reach a desired state.
• Declarative programming – defines program logic, but not detailed control flow.
• Functional programming – treats programs as evaluating mathematical functions and avoids state and mutable data
• Object-oriented programming (OOP) – organizes programs as objects: data structures consisting of datafields and methods together with their interactions.
• Event-driven programming – program control flow is determined by events, such as sensor inputs or user actions (mouse clicks, key presses) or messages from other programs or threads.
• Automata-based programming – a program, or part, is treated as a model of a finite state machine or any other formal automaton.

None of the main programming paradigms have a precise, globally unanimous definition, nor official international standard. Nor is there any agreement on which paradigm constitutes the best method to developing software. The subroutines that implement OOP methods may be ultimately coded in an imperative, functional, or procedural style that may, or may not, directly alter state on behalf of the invoking program.

Paradigm	Description	Main traits	Related paradigm(s)	Critique	Examples
Imperative	Programs as statements that directly change computed state (datafields)	Direct assignments, common data structures, global variables		Edsger W. Dijkstra, Michael A. Jackson	C, C++, Java, PHP, Python, Ruby
Structured	A style of imperative programming with more logical program structure	Structograms, indentation, no or limited use of goto statements	Imperative		C, C++, Java, Python
Procedural	Derived from structured programming, based on the concept of modular programming or the procedure call	Local variables, sequence, selection, iteration, and modularization	Structured, imperative		C, C++, Lisp, PHP, Python
Functional	Treats computation as the evaluation of mathematical functions avoiding state and mutable data	Lambda calculus, compositionality, formula, recursion, referential transparency, no side effects	Declarative		C++,[1] Clojure, Coffeescript,[2] Elixir, Erlang, F#, Haskell, Lisp, Python, Ruby, Scala, SequenceL, Standard ML, JavaScript
Event-drivenincluding time-driven	Control flow is determined mainly by events, such as mouse clicks or interrupts including timer	Main loop, event handlers, asynchronous processes	Procedural, dataflow		JavaScript, ActionScript, Visual Basic, Elm
Object-oriented	Treats datafields as objects manipulated through predefined methods only	Objects, methods, message passing, information hiding, data abstraction, encapsulation, polymorphism, inheritance, serialization-marshalling	Procedural	Here and[3][4][5]	Common Lisp, C++, C#, Eiffel, Java, PHP, Python, Ruby, Scala, JavaScript[6][7]
Declarative	Defines program logic, but not detailed control flow	Fourth-generation languages, spreadsheets, report program generators			SQL, regular expressions, CSS, Prolog, OWL, SPARQL
Automata-based programming	Treats programs as a model of a finite state machine or any other formal automata	State enumeration, control variable, state changes, isomorphism, state transition table	Imperative, event-driven		Abstract State Machine Language

Differences in terminology

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_programming_paradigms