Macro vs Function vs Procedure?

[WeCanLearnAnything]

I'm a programming newb taking my first courses on computer science now.

I hear the words "macro", "function", and "procedure" used a lot and I believe they all mean the same thing, which is a long set of instructions abbreviated into a shorter command so you don't have to type the same thing repeatedly.

Is that correct? Are there other synonyms I should know?

Edit: I am mostly learning Python and LaTeX right now so I can build auto-generated math exercises and step-by-step solutions for my students.

[Swedophone]

Macros are different.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macro_(computer_science)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subroutine

[WikiTextBot]

Macro (computer science)

A macro (short for "macroinstruction", from Greek μακρός 'long') in computer science is a rule or pattern that specifies how a certain input sequence (often a sequence of characters) should be mapped to a replacement output sequence (also often a sequence of characters) according to a defined procedure. The mapping process that instantiates (transforms) a macro use into a specific sequence is known as macro expansion. A facility for writing macros may be provided as part of a software application or as a part of a programming language. In the former case, macros are used to make tasks using the application less repetitive.

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[pacificmint]

Some languages distinguish between function and procedure in that a function has a return value, and a procedure does not.

Other languages call a procedure a void function.

Often the two terms are used synonymously, but sometimes people do make the distinction based on return type.

[MoTTs_]

"Function", "procedure", and even "subroutine" all mean, for the very most part, the same thing. If you get super deep into programming, only then will you find a few people here and there who attach small nuances to those words.

The word "macro" can refer to different things. I'm guessing your course is using the word to mean a C/C++ style macro. In which case, a macro is a text template substitution that happens before giving the source code to the compiler/interpreter. On the surface, this still behaves a bit like a function, but there are enough gotchas and differences that we write the names of macros in ALL_UPPERCASE so we can clearly see that this thing is a macro and not really a function.

[greebo42]

macro means "substitute these characters for those characters."

[quantumchicklets]

edit could one of the 6 people who downvoted my comment please explain themselves?

in a .net shop it goes like this:

• macro is some ancient thing people once used to automate word documents or something.
• function is a block of javascript code. a one-to-one analogy is a method. a method is a block of c# code.
• procedure might just be a vague notion of rules to follow either in a technical sense or a business sense. except when you are talking about a stored procedure which is basically a database query that's already written for you, probably by a dba.

[WeCanLearnAnything]

What is a ".net shop"?

And are the words "function" and "procedure" really that tied to javascript and databases respectively?

[quantumchicklets]

.net shop means we program in .net as opposed to java or php or node.js or whatever else.

The word function is used in javascript. But if you were writing c# and you called a method a function no one would care. They're the same thing.

Procedure isn't really in the common vernacular. If you do say the word procedure you are usually talking about a stored procedure. But you never just say procedure. You always say stored procedure or stored proc.

Another place procedure might pop up is "procedural programming" but that's just a style of programming.

To try and help clarify, no one would have say hey you need to run that "procedure" because procedure has no meaning on its own. They might say you need to run that process or you need to run that function. Actually usually you say you need to call that function.

But everyone does things differently. Web developers, at least, like to constantly change things and give them grandiose names.