A Turing tarpit (or Turing tar-pit) is any

programming language A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Most programming languages are text-based formal languages, but they may also be graphical. They are a kind of computer language. The description of a programming l ...

or computer interface that allows for flexibility in function but is difficult to learn and use because it offers little or no support for common tasks. The phrase was coined in 1982 by

Alan Perlis Alan Jay Perlis (April 1, 1922 – February 7, 1990) was an American computer scientist and professor at Purdue University, Carnegie Mellon University and Yale University. He is best known for his pioneering work in programming languages and was t ...

in the '' Epigrams on Programming'': In any

Turing complete Alan Mathison Turing (; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist. Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical co ...

language, it is possible to write any computer program, so in a very rigorous sense nearly all programming languages are equally capable. However, having that theoretical ability is not the same as usefulness in practice. Turing tarpits are characterized by having a simple

abstract machine An abstract machine is a computer science theoretical model that allows for a detailed and precise analysis of how a computer system functions. It is analogous to a mathematical function in that it receives inputs and produces outputs based on p ...

that requires the user to deal with many details in the solution of a problem. At the extreme opposite are interfaces that can perform very complex tasks with little human intervention but become obsolete if requirements change slightly. Some

esoteric programming languages An esoteric programming language (sometimes shortened to esolang) is a programming language designed to test the boundaries of computer programming language design, as a proof of concept, as software art, as a hacking interface to another language ...

, such as

Brainfuck Brainfuck is an esoteric programming language created in 1993 by Urban Müller. Notable for its extreme minimalism, the language consists of only eight simple commands, a data pointer and an instruction pointer. While it is fully Turing com ...

, are specifically referred to as "Turing tarpits" because they deliberately implement the minimum functionality necessary to be classified as Turing complete languages. Using such languages is a form of mathematical recreation: programmers can work out how to achieve basic programming constructs in an extremely difficult but mathematically Turing-equivalent language.Esoteric Topics in Computer Programming
Cat's Eye Technologies, Canada. (''"They present the programmer with the challenge, intrigue, and entertainment of looking at known algorithms and concepts in a whole new light."'')

See also

References

Further reading