This article has multiple issues. Please helpimprove it or discuss these issues on thetalk page.(Learn how and when to remove these messages) This articlemay containexcessive orirrelevant examples. Please helpimprove it by removingless pertinent examples andelaborating on existing ones.(June 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this message) This article mayrequirecleanup to meet Wikipedia'squality standards. The specific problem is:List inclusion criteria. Please helpimprove this article if you can.(February 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this message) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Non-English-based programming languages areprogramming languages that do not use keywords taken from or inspired byEnglish vocabulary.

The use of theEnglish language in the inspiration for the choice of elements, in particular forkeywords in computer programming languages and code libraries, represents a significant trend in the history of language design. According to the HOPL online database of languages,^[1] out of the 8,500+ programming languages recorded, roughly 2,400 of them were developed in theUnited States, 600 in theUnited Kingdom, 160 inCanada, and 75 inAustralia. Thus, over a third of all programming languages have been developed in countries where English is the primary language. This does not take into account the usage share of each programming language, situations where a language was developed in a non-English-speaking country but used English to appeal to an international audience (see the case ofPython from theNetherlands,Ruby fromJapan, andLua fromBrazil), and situations where it was based on another programming language which used English.

The concept of international-style programming languages was inspired by the work of Britishcomputer scientistsChristopher Strachey,Peter Landin, and others. It represents a class of languages of which the line of the algorithmic languagesALGOL was exemplary.

ALGOL 68's standard document was published in numerousnatural languages. The standard allowed the internationalization of the programming language. On December 20, 1968, the "Final Report" (MR 101) was adopted by the Working Group, then subsequently approved by the General Assembly ofUNESCO'sIFIP for publication. Translations of the standard were made forRussian,German,French,Bulgarian, and then laterJapanese. The standard was also available inBraille^{[clarification needed]}. ALGOL 68 went on to become theGOST/ГОСТ-27974-88 standard in theSoviet Union.

• GOST 27974-88 Programming language ALGOL 68 – Язык программирования АЛГОЛ 68^[2]
• GOST 27975-88 Programming language ALGOL 68 extended – Язык программирования АЛГОЛ 68 расширенный^[3]

In English, Algol68's case statement readscase ~in ~out ~esac. InRussian, this readsвыб ~в ~либо ~быв.

Localization is the core feature of theCitrine Programming Language. Citrine is designed to be translatable to every written human language. For instance theWest Frisian language version is called Citrine/FY. Citrine features localized keywords, localized numbers and localized punctuation. Users can translate code files from one language into another using a string-based approach. At the time of writing, Citrine supports 111 human languages. Support is not limited to well-known languages; all natural human languages up toEGIDS-6 are being accepted for inclusion.

Hedy is anopen-source programming language which was developed for programming education. It was designed to be as instructive as possible and as accessible as possible with a few unique features. As of September 2024^[update] it supports 47 different languages,^[4] meaning its keywords can be typed in any of those. It supports languages that do not use theLatin alphabet for their keywords and variable names and it also supports more numbering systems thanArabic numerals, likeEastern Arabic numerals. All of these can be used interchangeably. The error messages are quite verbose, explaining what is wrong and what might be a fix.

Whileinternationalization is not a part of anyScheme standard, the expressiveness and flexibility of the language allows for the addition of internationalization as alibrary.International Scheme is anopen source project to which anyone can contribute a translation. Since translations of Scheme can be loaded as libraries, Scheme programs can bemultilingual.

Scratch is a block-based educational language. The text of the blocks is translated into many languages, and users can select different translations. Unicode characters are supported in variable and list names. (Scratch lists are not stored inside variables the way arrays or lists are handled in most languages. Variables only store strings, numbers, and, with workarounds, Boolean values, while lists are a separate data type that store sequences of these values.) Projects can be "translated" by simply changing the language of the editor, although this does not translate the variable names.

• APL – A language based on mathematical notation and abstractions.
• Brainfuck – A minimalist esoteric programming language, created for the purpose of having the smallest possiblecompiler.^[98]
• Emojicode – An esoteric language based onEmojis.
• G – Graphical language used inLabVIEW (not to be confused with G-code).
• Hoon – A systems programming language for Urbit, compiling to Nock.
• J – AnAPL-like language which uses onlyASCII special characters and addsfunction-level programming.
• Light Pattern – A language which uses a series of photographs rather than text as source code.^[99]
• Mouse – A minimalist language created by Peter Grogono which uses ASCII characters for keywords.
• Piet – An art-based esoteric programming language.
• Plankalkül – The first high-level non-von Neumann programming language, designed byKonrad Zuse duringWorld War II inGermany.
• Whitespace – An esoteric language based onwhitespace characters (spaces, tabs, and line breaks).

• Babylscript – A multilingual version of JavaScript which uses multiple tokenizers to support localized keywords in different languages and which allows objects and functions to have different names in different languages.
• Component Pascal – A preprocessor that translates native-language keywords into English in an educational version of theBlackBox Component Builder available as open source.[1] The translation is controlled via a modifiable vocabulary and supported by modifiable compiler error messages. A complete Russian version is used in education, and it should be possible to accommodate other left-to-right languages (e.g., theKabardian language has been tried as a proof of concept).
• HyperTalk – A programming language, which allows translation via custom resources, used inApple'sHyperCard.
• IronPerunis – An IronPython 2.7 localization to Lithuanian and Russian.
• AppleScript – A language which once allowed for different "dialects"^[100] including French and Japanese; however, these were removed in later versions.
• Maude – Completely user-definable syntax and semantics, within the bounds of the ASCII character set.^[101]
• Perl – While Perl's keywords and function names are generally in English, it allows modification of its parser to modify the input language, such as inDamian Conway'sLingua::Romana::Perligata module, which allows programs to be written in Latin or Michael G. Schwern'sLingua::tlhInganHol::yIghun Perl language in Klingon. They do not just change the keywords but also the grammar to match the language.
• Ioke – Ioke is a folding language. It allows writing highly expressive code that writes code. Examples of same program inChinese,Danish,Hindi andSpanish

• Pigott, Diarmuid (2006)."HOPL, the History of Programming Languages". Archived fromthe original on 2011-02-20. Retrieved2008-04-14.

• SAKO information page at HOPL – By Diarmuid Pigott

• Non-English-based programming languages
• Lists of programming languages
• Natural language and computing

• CS1 Russian-language sources (ru)
• CS1 uses Japanese-language script (ja)
• CS1 Japanese-language sources (ja)
• CS1 Spanish-language sources (es)
• All articles with dead external links
• Articles with dead external links from July 2019
• Articles with permanently dead external links
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles with too many examples from June 2020
• All articles with too many examples
• Wikipedia articles with style issues from June 2020
• Articles needing cleanup from February 2015
• All pages needing cleanup
• Cleanup tagged articles with a reason field from February 2015
• Wikipedia pages needing cleanup from February 2015
• Articles with multiple maintenance issues
• Wikipedia articles needing clarification from March 2022
• Articles containing potentially dated statements from September 2024
• All articles containing potentially dated statements
• Articles with dead external links from August 2024
• Articles containing Japanese-language text
• Articles containing Korean-language text