Computer Scripting Language

computer scripting language, a computer language intended to solve relatively small programming problems that do not require the overhead of data declarations and other features needed to make large programs manageable. Scripting languages are used for writing operating system utilities, for special-purpose file-manipulation programs, and, because they are easy to learn, sometimes for considerably larger programs.

Perl, one such language, was developed in the late 1980s, originally for use with the UNIX operating system. It was intended to have all the capabilities of earlier scripting languages. Perl provided many ways to state common operations and thereby allowed a programmer to adopt any convenient style. In the 1990s it became popular as a system programming tool, both for small utility programs and for prototypes of larger ones. Together with other languages, it also became popular for programming computer Web servers. Perl was largely supplanted in the early 21st century by Python, another such scripting language.