Hello, World!

Welcome to the blog. We're WheelHouse Software - an agency who specialise in bespoke software development. Our goal is to help charities and other purpose-led organisations by providing web and mobile app development, strategy consulting, and other services. Today, we wanted to share a classic message with our readers: "Hello, World!"

For those unfamiliar with the term, "Hello, World" is an extremely simple program usually used to introduce beginners to a new programming language. It consists of a single line of code that prints the words "Hello, World" to the screen. Here it is in Javascript:

console.log("Hello, World!");

The "Hello, World!" program was made famous by a textbook written in 1978 (The C Programming Language) but according to wikipedia there are examples of it going back as far as 1967. So for more than half a century, this tiny trivial computer program has been popping up in lecture slides, textbooks and tutorials.

Given it doesn't do anything remotely useful, it's kind of surprising that "Hello, World" has been so well known for so long. So what's going on there? I think there are 2 reasons it's survived so long:

First, it shows programmers the basic syntax of a programming language. Does it have semicolons at the end of each line? What do functions look like? You might think you wouldn't see much of a different in syntax with such a simple program, but here it is in C++:

std::cout << "Hello World";

And in Java:

System.out.println("Hello World");

The second great thing about "Hello, World!" is that it's so small! In most languages, the whole thing will be no more than 5 lines, which means very little room for error. It serves as a starting point for learners to build upon, and allows them to see the results of their efforts pretty much immediately.

At WheelHouse Software, we believe that the key to successful software development is to start with a solid foundation. By taking the time to learn the basics and understand the fundamentals, our team is able to tackle even the most complex projects with confidence and expertise.

So, from all of us at WheelHouse Software, "Hello, World" and welcome to the world of software development! We look forward to creating amazing solutions for our clients and continuing to learn and grow as a team.