Difference between functional and imperative languages? why is functional programming important in Spark





Functional programming languages: It is based on a purely functional approach to complex problem-solving and it is another form of declarative programming. The functional programming languages are used in Scala, Lisp, etc.

Imperative programming languages: It is a paradigm of computer programming succession of steps that may change the state of the computer. The imperative programming language is used in Java, Python, C, R, JavaScript, etc.

Difference between functional and imperative languages:

Functional programming languages:

  • What information is desired and what transformed and actions are required within the function calls in functional programming.
  • In functional programming languages are primary flow control is function calls, recursion in Scala programming in the Spark.
  • In Scala order of execution is low importance compared to imperative programming languages.
  • Functions are based on objects oriented and data collections. Instead of for loops, while loops are used recursion.
  • In Spark, while using Scala most of the cases using transformations  & Actions like a map, flatMap, filter, reduceByKey, count, collect, etc.
  • It is a fixed set of items like transformations and actions based on problem-solving

Imperative programming languages:

  • Imperative programming languages how to perform algorithms and how to track changes state.
  • Compared to functional programming languages order of execution is more important.
  • In Imperative languages based on Loops, conditionals, and different method calls.




Why is functional programming important in Spark

 

In the Spark framework, functional programming is an important key role in app development. It is object-based on programming methods.

To increase the readability and maintainability of the complex code. Very less line code of programming in Scala. Testing and debugging is very easy compared to imperative programming languages.

For large data processing using Scala because simple to implement and developing and debugging the code. Scala is very simple to understand the code to other programmers as well and easy to learn.