declarative language

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declarative language - Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (26 May 2007) :

  declarative language
  
     <language> Any relational language or functional language.
     These kinds of programming language describe relationships
     between variables in terms of functions or inference rules
     , and the language executor (interpreter or
     compiler) applies some fixed algorithm to these relations
     to produce a result.
  
     Declarative languages contrast with imperative languages
     which specify explicit manipulation of the computer's internal
     state; or procedural languages which specify an explicit
     sequence of steps to follow.
  
     The most common examples of declarative languages are logic programming
      languages such as Prolog and functional languages
      like Haskell.
  
     See also production system.
  
     (2004-05-17)