Chapter 2. Mid-Term Emerging Technologies And Standards
5. The purpose of this section is to identify a number of key emerging (commercial) technologies that are relevant to NATO and to provide a useful level of analysis about their possible application within military systems. While the emerging technologies discussed in this section are not exhaustive, the content of this section does draw significantly upon the technology tracking efforts of the NOSWG member nations. Once technologies are identified and their applicability analysed, then informed decisions can be made on what role each technology or standard will play in the current technical architecture. The rapid pace of technological change carries with it the potential benefits of faster and more cost-effective improvements in operational capability; however, the rapidity of change upon a broad technology front also makes the task of identifying emerging technologies particularly difficult.
6. The intention of this element of the NISP volume 3 is to be informative, whilst maintaining brevity, on a range of technologies. Consequently, the information is presented as a series of short articles that cover the essential points of interest. This flexible format is intended to facilitate the rapid change of content that will inevitably happen between issues of the NISP.
2.1. Computing
7. Computing is usually defined as the activity of using and developing computer technology, computer hardware and software. It is the computer-specific part of information technology.
2.1.1. Programming Languages
8. A programming language is an artificial language designed to express computations that can be performed by a machine. Programing languages have written specifications of their syntax and specification.
2.1.1.1. F Sharp (F#)
9. Developed by Microsoft, F# is a strongly-typed language that uses type inference. As a result, data types need not be explicitly declared by the programmer; they will be deduced by the compiler during compilation. However, F# also allows explicit data type declaration. Being a .NET language, F# supports .NET types and objects. But it extends the type system and categorizes types as immutable types or mutable types. .NET objects classify as mutable types (which can be edited in-place), and are used to provide an object-oriented programming model. Immutable types (editing which creates a new instance without overwriting the older one) are primarily used for functional programming.
10. Status : Now being transitioned towards a fully supported language on the .NET platform.