Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Translator (computing)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was speedy keep. Nomination withdrawn with no !votes made to delete. (non-admin closure) Deadbeef 06:24, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Translator (computing)

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I have taken courses in programming languages and compiler design at the university, and have never heard this term. The term for a computer program transforming from one language to another is simply "compiler". To compile simply means to translate from one language to another. Also, article has no references, and a quick Google search doesn't find anything but Wikipedia itself. And the inclusion of interpreters in that article just underscores how misguided it is, since an interpreter certainly doesn't translate anything. Thue (talk) 02:11, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy keep: Well, there are even some university courses that cover translators within the context of programming languages. At the same time, intepreters also translate computer programs from one language to another, it's just that they don't do that at once but incrementally during the execution of a program. — Dsimic (talk | contribs) 03:57, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Keep This is a common term in computer science. Here is the Encyclopedia Britannica entry on program translation. "Program translation" nets about 2,200 hits on GScholar. Chapter 5 (first edition) of the standard Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools book by Aho. Sethi, and Ullman is on syntax-directed translation. And so on. There are more than enough reliable sources out there with which to write a reasonable article on this subject. --Mark viking (talk) 04:08, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough, I retract. The term was not used at my university, and the total lack of references tricked me. Also, I am still going to replace the use of the "translator" term with "compiler" at KPHP, since using the more specific term is always better. And compilers do include compiling to other languages than assembler/machine code. Thue (talk) 04:56, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

As our Compiler article says in its lead section, "the name 'compiler' is primarily used for programs that translate source code from a high-level programming language to a lower level language (e.g., assembly language or machine code)", so calling KPHP a compiler would be actually slightly misleading. Calling it a "source-to-source translator" is as specific as it should be. — Dsimic (talk | contribs) 05:03, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. ^BE _CK ^Y _SA ^{Y L}E _S 04:59, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Technology-related deletion discussions. ^BE _CK ^Y _SA ^{Y L}E _S 05:00, 7 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.