Applicative programming language

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title: "Applicative programming language" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["programming-language-classification", "applicative-computing-systems"] topic_path: "technology/computing" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applicative_programming_language" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

In the classification of programming languages, an applicative programming language is built out of functions applied to arguments. Applicative languages are functional, and applicative is often used as a synonym for functional. However, concatenative languages can be functional, while not being applicative.

The semantics of applicative languages are based on beta reduction of terms, and Side effect such as mutation of state are not permitted.

Lisp and ML are applicative programming languages.

(2008-01-01). "Applicative programming with effects". Journal of Functional Programming.
(1985). "Logic Programming cum Applicative Programming".
Jon Purdy. (12 February 2012). "Why Concatenative Programming Matters".
(1978). "Can programming be liberated from the von Neumann style?: A functional style and its algebra of programs". Communications of the ACM.

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