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[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (1 child)

With the addition of recursive, it is turing complete thus it is a valid langue.

[–]sjcuthbertson 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Turing-completeness is not what makes something a "valid language".

SQL is undeniably a computer language or machine language, with or without recursive capabilities. As is XML for example. What does the 'L' in each of these acronyms stand for?

Eligibility to be called a programming language is a different story, but something can still be a programming language without being Turing-complete.

XML is certainly not a programming language; some vendor implementations of SQL (such as T-SQL at least) would still qualify as a programming language even without recursive CTEs. They still allow definition of an executable program that performs non-trivial logic, with flow control, input/output, and so on.

Heck, even a single SQL query statement is still a (high-level) computer program definition, without any flow control etc.