are HTMl and CSS "real" languages?

[eternalworm2008]

I just got into progamming so i dont know about many of the inside jokes within the community, but I hear HTML and CSS arent "real"
languages and that one should learn somethinge else.

I myself am learning HTML because i wanted to make my own website, should i give up and learn a real language like c, c++ or assembly?

Im going to do so either way, i want to make a video game with either c++ or gdscript, i just want to see your opinion...    

[Dan Q]

Yes. Both HTML and CSS are real programming languages. They are languages used to really program (that is, instruct) a computer.

Calling them not-real languages ignores what they are: ways of writing instructions that tells a computer how to behave. They're not procedural languages which is what people sometimes mean when they make this kind of argument... but then neither is ANSI SQL. Or (depending on how you write them) some functional languages. So that's no real argument. Also: just look at things like Blackle Mori's excellent "CSS Puzzle Box", made with only HTML and CSS. They're "real" languages, for sure.

Calling them not-real languages is also often used as a form of sexism. A lot of pioneering innovation in Web technologies and design, and finding imaginative ways to use these tools, was done by people who weren't men. And then men (who wrote JavaScript, obviously) got uppity. Sigh.

I like Chris Ferdinandi's take on the question. But if you'd like a more-sarcastic take on it, I highly recommend Heydon Pickering's hilarious video "Is HTML A Programming Language?".

[monsterrobotics]

I'd like to echo Dan's reply, because my response was going to be the same: Yes.

Just because some people think it's easy or trivial doesn't mean it's not real. I like what Dan said, too:

Calling them not-real languages is also often used as a form of sexism. A lot of pioneering innovation in Web technologies and design, and finding imaginative ways to use these tools, was done by people who weren't men. And then men (who wrote JavaScript, obviously) got uppity. Sigh.

Amateur that I am at the subject of programming, I do note how CSS/HTML is structured fairly uniquely as opposed to something like Python or C++ or JavaScript, where I find that you can learn one and things transfer over (although you need a bit of translation to learn the dialects  ). However, my design/art skills help me understand and translate and learn this language. I think it's a valuable language that is accessible to a lot of people, which makes the internet a more human, personable place. In that way ("easy to learn, hard to master"), I think people look down upon it. Then, as Dan mentioned, in our current world it seems like women like to use it to be creative + the imbalance in the tech industry, thus a bit of sexism is involved with this "joke".

You can learn both and both are valuable for different purposes.

[Melooon]

So in programing there's a scale from high-level to low-level languages. Programmers do sometimes have an attitude that low-level languages are "real" languages, but what it really defines is how close to the CPU your code is running. CPUs are basically little tubs full of esoteric commands, and every interface on your computer (including programing languages) is basically a bunch of human friendly commands that need to be converted down into those esoteric CPU friendly commands.

HTML is very high, it needs a browser to read it and then a bunch of support code under that to eventually connect to the CPU. C# is also high because it uses a translator to read it and convert it down. C++ is quite low, it does not need a huge amount of conversion to reach the CPU commands, and then assembly is very low, it's almost directly CPU language.

The key thing is that, the more steps you need to take to convert your interaction down to CPU commands, the more time it takes, and the more external code you need to depend on that's outside your control.

If you're a computer scientist there are some advantages to programing at a very low level, like assembly, for experimental work, its also useful if your programing for very old computers (like 1970s mainframes and gameboys) with super limited power; a big game studio, or an operating system maker might value C++ because they need code that's extremely efficient in order to make a very complex program run fast; however for basically anyone programing on their own today it does not matter what level your working at.

Unless your working on something very technical that needs immense speed and control, 99.9% of indie games run just fine using any language level, it wont impact your game; and a successful game made in HTML is infinity better than a failed attempt at making a game in C++.

HTML as a whole is much more useful for the average person than assembly is, even though assembly is much more technically powerful than HTML - both can be used to create the same thing, but most HTML pages can be made in an hour, while creating the same thing in assembly could take months!

Its really all about picking the tools that are going to empower you, and let you create the best thing you can create; and how that fits into the wider world of who will play your game, where it will be played, and what it needs to be the best game it can be. Your programing language is just one of the tools to do that stuff, programmers often have an inflated sense of self importance (I know I am one!), when, to be frank its quite a small part of what matters 

[starbreaker]

I just got into progamming so i dont know about many of the inside jokes within the community, but I hear HTML and CSS arent "real"
languages and that one should learn somethinge else.

I myself am learning HTML because i wanted to make my own website, should i give up and learn a real language like c, c++ or assembly?

Im going to do so either way, i want to make a video game with either c++ or gdscript, i just want to see your opinion...    

Even if you learned C, you wouldn't be able to make a website with C alone. Your C program would have to output HTML, so you'd still have to learn HTML so you could write your C program.

When you hear somebody tell you that HTML and CSS aren't "real" programming languages, it means that they weren't listening in Computer Science 101 when the professor went over the differences between declarative programming languages and imperative languages.

Declarative languages like HTML and CSS allow you to tell the computer (or the browser) what you want, but how the machine implements your instructions is outside your control.

With an imperative language like C, you are telling the computer exactly how to carry out a task at an extremely low and granular level, to the point where you have to deal with memory allocation yourself.

None of this really matters, though. It's just pseudo-intellectual dick-waving. Learn the appropriate tools and languages for what you're trying to accomplish. If you want to make a website, that means HTML, CSS, and maybe JavaScript, in that order. Anybody who tells you those aren't real programming languages is narrow-minded, ignorant, and insecure.