Programming Language Translators

Assembler

An assembler translates assembly language into machine code.

Compiler

A compiler translates code written in a high level programming language into object code, the machine code of a particular machine. It 'compiles' the entire source code before translating it. The compiler has several advantages over interpreters, such as: the object code is saved, meaning there is no need to re-compile; compiled code executes faster than interpreted code; the object code can easily be distributed without the compiler; and compiled code is more secure, as it is harder to reverse engineer than interpreted code.

Interpreter

An interpreter also translates code written in a programming language into object code, but unlike a compiler it does this one line of code at a time. This makes it slower to run than a compiler, but interpreters are useful for partially testing or debugging programs.