Computers need programming languages to function. That’s just a simple fact of life. However, these languages didn’t just spring up out of nowhere. They were developed by people for explicit purposes.

For 50 years, computer programmers have been writing code. New technologies continue to emerge, develop, and mature at a rapid pace. Now there are more than 2,500 documented programming languages!

Invented by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, BASIC was first successfully ...

For the rest of the history of modern programming languages -- because C was really just the beginning! -- check out the infographic below. You can click it to zoom in.

There's more to the story than the alphabet.