What Computer Programming is All About

by Frederick Hoehn, copyright 2015, all rights reserved.

Chapter 1

Computer programming is writing the code that makes the computer do what you want it to do.  

You can't write a couple of paragraphs in the English language about what the program should do, and then have the computer do that for you.  

Computers don't speak English.  

But there are some translation programs that could give you a rough translation from one language into another.  

I say rough because languages generally have more sophistication than computer translation programs do.  And many languages have their idiomatic expressions.  

If I say to my child, "Eat," is that a sentence?  

Yes, however, it has something missing that we generally find in sentences.  

There's no subject.  

The subject is YOU.

But YOU is not in the sentence.  The YOU is just understood.  

But the computer might have trouble understanding that.  

Computers are not geniuses.  Their big advantage is that they are very fast at processing data.  

But they can't do that unless someone gives them a good program to execute.  

Computers execute programs in what is called "Machine Language." 

This gets down to the 1's and 0's that you see from time to time on TV shows that talk about computers.  

These 1's and 0's are what constitute the binary number system.  

There are no 2's or 3's in the binary number system, just 1's and 0's.  

Years ago there were a few analog computers.  But it was found that digital computers are much more accurate than analog computers.  

The basic reason for that is that those analog computers represented the numbers 0 through 9 with voltages.  

You might let zero volts represent the number 0.  And then 1 volt for the number 1.  Two volts for number 2, all the way up to nine volts for the number 9.

So far, so good.  

And if you do a good design of the computer, it will probably work OK until the electronic components start to age.  

One of the electronic components you would use in the design of your analog computer is the resistor.  

Resistors are rated for their resistance and wattage.  The wattage is how much heat they can dissipate.      

The resistance of a resistor is measured in Ohms (after George Simon Ohm).  

But if you started with a hundred Ohm resistor, after a while, it wouldn't be a hundred Ohm resistor anymore.  Its resistance will gradually change.  

Now multiply that by many thousands of resistors in your analog computer, and the voltage that should have been 9 volts for the number 9, is looking closer to 8 volts for number 8, even though it was meant to be 9 volts for number 9.  

We see that in Civil Engineering.  You could build a wonderful bridge, according to the best Construction Codes and Engineering Principles.  

But come back twenty years later, and you'll probably see brown rust.  

Come back fifty years later, and the bridge might be close to collapsing.  

But digital computers don't have that problem that analog computers have.   

There are not ten different voltages to represent the ten different numbers.  There are only two voltages.  High and low.  On and off.  One or zero.

One of the various different microprocessors used 5 volts for the high (the 1), and zero volts for the low (zero).    

You don't use the decimal number system, you use the binary number system, which only has 1's and 0's.  

But if you need results in the decimal number system, the computer program can convert those binary numbers into decimal and print them out on a printer.  

But Machine Language is a very cumbersome language to write your computer program in.  

You have to mess with all those 1's and 0's.  

So, we have Assembly Languages.  

Assembly Languages are easier to work with, and use "Mnemonics," abbreviations like ADD, or ADC.  

ADD would be just a plain add operation.  ADC is an ADD, plus add in any carry bit, if there is one, from a previous add of a less significant digit.  

If you want to add 15 plus 7, first you add the 5 and the 7, and you get 2 plus a carry.  

Then you add the 1 plus the carry and get 2, and the result is 22.  

God's creation is just full of numbers.  How many drops of water in the Atlantic Ocean?

How many in the Pacific Ocean?

And how many gallons does that make for each ocean?

How many liters?

God needed to be pretty darn good at math to be the Creator, and He is.  

And God knows all about the math of computers.  I believe God invented computers long before man got the idea for computers.    

We write programs in Assembly Language because it's more convenient than writing them in Machine Language.  

But the computer can't execute the Assembly Language programs.

So, when you've finished your Assembly Language program, you process the Assembly Language program with another program called an "Assembler."

The Assembler takes your Assembly Language program, and makes an executable program in Machine Language (1's and 0's).

When we do that, the Assembly Language program is called the Source Code, and the Machine Language program is called the Object Code.  

It is the Object Code that is executable by the computer.  

Chapter 2

I had a job where, as Programmer, I was writing Source code in Assembly Language.  

The main product at that company was a Protocol Converter.  

At that job, execution speed of the object code was very important, and Assembly Language programs generally run faster than programs in a higher language, such as C, or FORTRAN, or C++ (pronounced C plus plus).  

Another reason for using Assembly Language there is that, as far as I know, we didn't have a Compiler for a higher level language.  

But Assembly Language programming is still rather cumbersome.

If execution speed of the program is not vitally important, it's generally better to write your program in a higher language such as C++.

C++ will result in more lines of object code per line of source code than an Assembly Language program.  Thus, C++ is a more powerful programming language than an Assembly Language.  

I learned to program in C++ by reading the book, "C++ From the Ground Up," by Herbert A. Schildt.  

Schildt is one of the best authors of programming books.  

If you write your program in the C++ language, then your C++ program is your Source Code, but it's not executable by the computer.

You take your C++ source code and process it with a program called a "Compiler," and the Compiler produces the executable object code.  

A  C++ Compiler that I have used came from a company called Bloodshed.  

Got my first one of those Compilers on a disk that came with a Howard W. Sams book on C++.

As I recall, that compiler worked satisfactorily with the Windows 7 Operating System, and earlier Microsoft Operating Systems. 

But when Windows 8 came out, that Bloodshed Compiler doesn't seem to work with Windows 8.  

That Protocol Converter that was our product allowed a very inexpensive ASCII printer to be used to replace an expensive IBM printer.  

Much of the IBM equipment was leased to the customer, rather than sold, in those days.

But that might have changed since then.  

So that can be a big savings of money if you're a large corporation with a room full of printers.  

That Protocol Converter used a combination of a microprocessor and a "state machine."

The microprocessor did the operations that were not so time-critical that they had to be done by the state machine.  

The state machine did the operations that needed the greatest speed.  

The microprocessor had its program stored in three Read Only Memories (ROM's).  Those were integrated circuit chips that plugged into sockets on the motherboard.  

The state machine used some high speed ROM's to direct its activities.

As I recall, there were seven different states to the state machine.  

It would start out in state 1, and then an event would trigger its going to state 2.  Then an event would trigger state 3, etc.   Finally, it would go back to state 1.   

The state machine was a device that used solid state digital components (transistorized).  

The state machine would perform a limited number of high speed operations.  

I was able, while employed there, to reduce the number of microprocessor ROM's from three to two.  

The Manager asked me how I did that.  

I explained that a previous programmer had put into the ROM's a look-up table with 1024 elements of 16 bits each (two bytes).  

It was a table that was used in the conversion between EBCDIC to ASCII.  Those two are ways of encoding the alphabet.  

ASCII is an acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, a widely used code in much of the computing world.   

But that table with its two-byte entries had one of its bytes (8 bits) that was always the same for each of the 1024 elements of the table.

There was no need to waste ROM space that way.  

You reduce the table to one byte for each of the 1024 entries, and then when the information gets put into the appropriate microprocessor register, you load the common byte with a "Load Immediate" instruction, which supplies that operand, and save a lot of ROM space.  

We had a 1 K version of the Protocol Converter, and a 2 K version, at the customer's option.    

So, the 2 K version had twice as much RAM memory. (Random Access Memory that was both read and write memory.)

But I noticed that although the 1 K version was called 1 K, it actually used less than half of that memory space for our application.  

So then, with just 1 K of RAM integrated circuit chips, you could actually have a 2 K device.   

I made the changes to hardware and ROM.  

I went to the Manager and pointed out that you could actually have a 2 K device with only 1 K of RAM chips.

He answered, "There was some reason why that couldn't be done."

I said, "Well anyway, I did it, and that box over there is a 2 K machine with only 1 K of RAM chips."

They had been talking for quite a while about redesigning the product, using the new chips that were available that performed the SDLC operations, saving a lot of chips that were doing the same job in the current product, and also because the product's printed circuit boards were sometimes faulty.  

I told the salesman for the SDLC chips that we were going to do a new design that would use his company's new SDLC chips, and he opened the trunk of his car and gave me a complete set of his integrated circuit chip catalogs, with their product specifications and data.   

Using a Signetics microcontroller, I did a redesign of the product that replaced both the old microprocessor and the state machine.

I hadn't really been hired as a Hardware Engineer, but as a Software Engineer.  But I had the Digital Hardware background, and gave them a better product.  

Someone did the cost analysis and said they could make the new Protocol Converter for less than they were making the old one.   

I found the technical information on their microcontroller product to be exceptionally well written by the folks at Signetics.   

When I was doing the translation from the King James Bible into the "Holy Bible, Hoehn Version," I wrote those programs in the C++ programming language.  

Of course, you can't write a program that does the whole job of translation of the Bible because of the complexity of the English language.  

But the computer programs took a lot of the drudgery out of the translation work.  

I had two lists of words.  

In the Bible, there are about twelve thousand different words, including all the names of people and places (proper nouns).  

One of my lists was all of the different words in the King James Version.

The other list was all of the different words that those King James words translated to in twenty first century American English.  

My program, every time it found a word in the King James list, it would substitute the word from the other list.  

Of course, some words were the same in both lists, such as "and," or "the."

But after running the programs, you then still have to go through manually to polish it up right.  

And one problem, of course, is that in the English language, a word can have two, or perhaps three meanings, and the computer programs didn't catch that problem.

So that's why you still have to go through manually, after running the computer program.  

I did the translation because, since I was a teenager, it seemed like something the Lord wanted me to do.  

If you know about something God wants you to do, then better do what God wants.  He knows how to spank people who disobey him.  

As I am writing this, a big news story of today is the shutting down of many of the flights of United Airlines, due to computer problems.  

They said on TV that this would cost United Airlines millions of dollars (in lost revenue).  

But another important news story of today was the shutting down of the New York Stock Exchange because of computer problems.

And the Wall Street Journal website shut down, too, for a while.  But the WSJ problem could have been due to a traffic overload from people trying to get stock market info after the NYSE shut down.  

But it was mentioned that in one of these three cases, an update of the software was done the night before.  

Aha!  There's a big clue.  

Anytime you try to do a software update, something may not go as planned.  

The new software may not have been thoroughly tested, and may have bugs in the software.  

A software bug is something wrong with the program that prevents the correct operation of the program.  

The name software bug probably originates from back when there were computers made that were based on electrical relays (discussed in my book, "Ladder Logic &...").  

Moths used to get into the computers, and when their wings got between the contacts of those physical electrical relays, their wings were insulators that prevented proper electrical connection of the contacts of the relays.  

Photos and a write-up on electrical relays can also be found at Wikipedia.org

I was working at Applied Technology Division of Litton Industries in the Silicon Valley area.  

A decision was made at the corporate level to move most of the computing from that facility to another Litton facility in Southern California.  

The IBM people had made statements to the effect that the move would be invisible to the users.  We wouldn't notice any difference.  

Those statements proved to be very much inaccurate.  

Some of the applications that we used didn't work right for the next month.  

Major software changes are not simple.  

Remember the many problems with the Obamacare website when it first rolled out?   

It took a long time to correct those problems.  

Another important news story is the hit against the Chinese Stock Exchange of a 30% drop in value over the last week or so.  

That is just a huge amount of money to have evaporated into thin air.  

And they say the Chinese Stock Exchange is the second largest stock exchange in the world.  

The Chinese Government is trying to prop up the Chinese Stock Exchange with emergency measures.  

The thing about stock markets, though, is that they very much depend on the whims of people, and it's practically impossible to regulate that.  

A story from a couple of weeks ago was the hacking into a Federal Government agency where the hackers obtained personal information of many thousands of government employees.  

Information that might be used in Identity Theft, a crime that seems to be happening a lot lately, and that does a lot of damage to its victims.    

I believe that information should have been stored in encrypted form.  

One kind of encryption substitutes a different letter for each letter of the alphabet to prevent the stored information from being used by the wrong people.  

Then you unencrypt the information when the right people need to use it.  

Encryption was widely used during World War 2 to prevent the use of critical information by the enemy.  

FBI director, James Comey, spoke on the subject of encryption of data, on TV today at a hearing. 

There is a lot of encryption software available now.  

If you've ever solved crossword puzzles from a Dell crossword puzzle magazine, they usually had some cryptogram puzzles for people to solve.

My Dad was pretty good at solving those puzzles, which substituted a different letter for each letter of the alphabet.  

And they also had "Word Arithmetic" puzzles where each of the numbers 0 through 9 represented a different letter of the alphabet. 

The puzzle was displayed as a mathematical long division problem where the letters were divided into letters producing a quotient in letters.    

You had to find out which number went with which letter.  Then arrange the letters in their number order, and they would spell a word.  

Dell offered free printed info on how to solve the Word Arithmetic problems.  I sent for it, got it, and used it to solve those problems.  

Another major news story is about the European Union setting a deadline of next Sunday, 07/12/15, for an agreement to be reached with the nation of Greece about solving the Greek debt problem.

An agreement might be reached about another bailout by the E.U. for Greece.  

As I understand it, if that agreement is not reached, that will be the end of E.U. bailout talks for Greece, which probably would be a disaster for Greece's economy.  

The head of state of Greece is this Mr. Tsipras.  It seems like every time I see him on TV, he's all smiles, as though he has everything under control.  

But in spite of all the smiles, I am not persuaded that he does have everything under control, and apparently the people at the E.U. don't think so, either.  

I understand that he's a man of about 40 years of age.  

It might have been a better idea for Greece to have chosen someone of significantly greater experience than Tsipras.  

Tsipras urged his nation to vote NO on the recent referendum, which 61% percent of the voters did.  

The NO vote was against austerity measures for Greece.  

This could be very bad for Greece, and Angela Merkel, of Germany, was saying, after the vote, that she saw no basis for continuing the discussions.  

Greece had better hope and pray that a bailout agreement will be reached by this new deadline, or there is the definite possibility of Greece's going bankrupt.  

And that would be a disaster for Greece, and probably not so good for the E.U.  

Experts are predicting a collapse of the Greek economy if an agreement is not reached by this new deadline.  

This Greek debt crisis might be an element in the hit suffered by the Chinese Stock Exchange.  

I had a job with Timex Corp.  You probably know them from their wrist watches.  

But for a while, Timex was in the personal computer business.  

They made a deal with Clive Sinclair in England.  They built a computer like his and sold it in the U.S.  

But it was only a monochrome computer, just black and white images on your TV screen.  

They wanted to make a better computer that would produce color images on the screen.  

But Timex got out of the personal computer business.

I wrote a computer program for them in the BASIC programming language to put vertical color bars on the screen.  

Here is that program:

10 For X = 1 to 7
20 Let Ink = X
30 Print "square square square"
40 Next X
50 Goto 10

Those numbers, 10 through 50, are called line numbers.  

On line 50, the program is told to go back to line 10.  This puts the program into an "infinite loop," but you can get out of it by pressing the "Break" key.  

In line 30, I didn't really say "square square square."  There was a key for a solid square on the Timex computer that I don't have on this computer.  

Line 30 would cause the computer to put three solid squares in a row on the screen, starting in the upper left corner, and proceeding from left to right.    

Lines 10 through 40 are what is called a "for next loop."   

Letter X is a variable that starts with a value of 1, and increments (counts up by 1) each time through the for next loop.  

When we talk about Ink, in the program, that doesn't mean the color of ink used to print on a piece of paper.  It just means the color of the square that will be put on the screen.  

In that Timex computer, each of the colors had a different number, such as maybe 2 for red, and four for green, for example.  

At line 40, the program will be sent back to the beginning of the for next loop, to continue with an X that is larger by one than the previous X.  

After seven iterations through the for next loop, line 50 sends the program back to the beginning.  

By the time you reach line 50, you've put twenty one squares on the screen in seven different colors of the rainbow.

Then you do it all again, and again, and again, providing new horizontal rows of squares, one right under the previous one.   

The result is a screen of vertical bars of seven different colors.  

But God had all of that figured out thousands of years ago, long before we learned to use electricity.  

"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows his handiwork." (Psa 19:1)

The eyes of the Lord run back and forth throughout the world, looking for those who fear Him.  

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.  All of those who do his commandments have good understanding." (Psa 111:10)

Jesus taught that we will all go either to heaven or hell.  In hell, there's crying and gnashing of teeth, where their worms don't die, and the fire is never quenched.  

But to go to heaven, you must be born again. (John chapt 3)

To become a Christian, obey Romans 10:9,10--
"That if you confess the Lord Jesus with your mouth, and believe in your heart God raised him from the dead, you're saved.  For with the heart man believes for righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made for salvation."

Other technical books by this author:  Ladder Logic & Programmable Controllers, Boolean Algebra, Algebra 1 (the basics), Trigonometry, How Computers Work.  (Available at Barnesandnoble.com)  

___James chapter 1
 1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes that are dispersed around, greetings.
 2 My brothers, count it all joy when you fall into various temptations,
 3 Knowing this, that the testing of your faith works patience.
 4 But let patience have its perfect work, so you'll be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
 5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God for it, who gives to all men liberally, and won't find fault, and it shall be given to him.
 6 But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.  For he that wavers is like a wave of the sea driven by the wind and tossed.
 7 For let that man not think that he'll receive anything from the Lord.
 8 A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.
 9 Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted,
 10 But the rich, in that he is made low, because as the flower of the grass he'll pass away.
 11 For the sun has no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withers the grass, and the flower of it falls, and the grace of the fashion of it perishes, so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.
 12 Blessed is the man that endures temptation, for after he's been tested, he'll receive the crown of life, that the Lord has promised to those who love him.
 13 Let no man say when he is tempted, "I am tempted by God," for God can't be tempted with evil, nor does he tempt any man,
 14 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed.
 15 Then when lust has conceived, it produces sin, and sin when it's finished, produces death.
 16 Do not err, my beloved brothers.
 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning.
 18 He chose to father us with the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits of his creatures.
 19 So, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger,
 20 For the anger of man doesn't accomplish the righteousness of God.
 21 So, lay apart all filthiness and the unnecessary naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.
 22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like a man seeing his natural face in a mirror,
 24 For he sees himself, and goes his way, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
 25 But whoever looks into the perfect law of liberty, and continues in it, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
 26 If any man among you seems to be religious, and doesn't bridle his tongue, but deceives his own heart, this man's religion is for nothing.
 27 Pure religion and undefiled before God the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

___James chapter 2
 1 My brothers, don't have the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons.
 2 For if a man with a gold ring comes to your assembly in fancy clothes, and a poor man in dirty clothes comes in also,
 3 And you have respect to him that wears the fancy clothes, and say to him, "Sit here in a good place," and say to the poor, "Stand there, or sit here under my footstool,"
 4 Aren't you then partial in yourselves, and have become judges with evil thoughts?
 5 Listen, my beloved brothers, hasn't God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him?
 6 But you have despised the poor.  Don't rich men oppress you, and bring you before the judgment seats?
 7 Don't they blaspheme that worthy name by which you're called?
 8 If you fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, "You shall love your neighbor like yourself," you do well,
 9 But if you have respect of persons, you commit sin, and are convicted by the law as sinners.
 10 For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.
 11 For he that said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not kill."  Now if you don't commit adultery, yet if you kill, you've become a breaker of the law.
 12 Speak in such a way, and do, as those who'll be judged by the law of liberty.
 13 For he shall have judgment without mercy, that has shown no mercy, and mercy rejoices against judgment.
 14 What does it profit, my brothers, though a man says he has faith, and doesn't have works?  Can faith save him?
 15 If a brother or sister needs clothes, and lacks daily food,
 16 And one of you says to them, "Depart in peace, be warmed and filled," but you don't give them the things that are needed for the body, what good is that?
 17 Even so faith, if it doesn't have works, is dead, being alone.
 18 Yes, a man could say, "You have faith, and I have works, show me your faith without your works, and I'll show you my faith by my works."
 19 You believe that there is one God, you do well, the devils also believe, and tremble.
 20 But don't you know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?
 21 Wasn't Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son on the altar?
 22 Do you see how faith worked with his deeds, and by works faith was made perfect?
 23 And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness, and he was called the friend of God."
 24 You see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.
 25 Likewise also wasn't Rahab the prostitute justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had sent them out another way?
 26 For like the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

___James chapter 3
 1 My brothers, don't be many masters, knowing that we'll receive the greater condemnation.
 2 For in many things we offend all.  If any man doesn't offend in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.
 3 See, we put bits in the horses' mouths, so they'll obey us, and we turn around their whole bodies.
 4 Look also at the ships, which though they're so large, and are driven by fierce winds, yet they're turned around by a very small helm, wherever the captain wants.
 5 Even so, the tongue is a little member, and boasts great things.  See how great a matter a little fire kindles!
 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of sin, so is the tongue among our members that it makes dirty the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature, and it is set on fire by hell.
 7 For every kind of animals, and of birds, and of snakes, and of things in the sea, gets tamed, and has been tamed by mankind,
 8 But no man can tame the tongue, it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.
 9 With it we bless God, the Father, and with it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God.
 10 Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing.  My brothers, these things ought not to be.
 11 Does a fountain send out at the same place sweet water and bitter?
 12 Can the fig tree, my brothers, produce olive berries?  Or a vine, figs?  So no fountain can yield both salt water and fresh.
 13 Who is a wise man, possessing knowledge among you?  Let him show out of a good lifestyle his works with meekness of wisdom.
 14 But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, don't glory, and don't lie against the truth.
 15 This wisdom doesn't descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish.
 16 For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.
 17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be reasoned with, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.
 18 And the fruit of righteousness is planted in peace by those who make peace.

___James chapter 4
 1 Where do wars and fightings among you come from?  Don't they come from your lusts that war in your members?
 2 You lust, and don't have, you kill, and desire to have, and can't obtain, you fight and war, yet you don't have, because you don't ask.
 3 You ask, and don't receive, because you ask wrongly, so you can consume it on your lusts.
 4 You adulterers and adulteresses, don't you know that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God?  Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world is an enemy of God.
 5 Do you think that the scripture says for nothing, "The spirit that lives in us lusts to envy?"
 6 But he gives more grace.  So he says, "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble."
 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God.  Resist the devil, and he'll run away from you.
 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.  Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double minded.
 9 Be afflicted, and mourn, and cry, let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.
 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he'll lift you up.
 11 Don't speak evil about each other, brothers.  He that speaks evil about his brother, and judges his brother, speaks evil about the law, and judges the law, but if you judge the law, you're not a doer of the law, but a judge.
 12 There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy, who are you that judges someone else?
 13 Go on now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we'll go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and make a profit,"
 14 Actually, you don't know what will happen tomorrow.  For what is your life?  It is a puff of steam, that appears for a little time, and then vanishes away.
 15 For you ought to say, "Lord willing, we'll live, and do this, or that."
 16 But now you rejoice in your boastings, all such rejoicing is evil.
 17 Therefore to him that knows to do good, and doesn't do it, to him it is sin.

___James chapter 5
 1 Go on now, you rich men, cry and howl for your miseries that shall come on you.
 2 Your riches are corrupted, and your clothes are moth eaten.
 3 Your gold and silver are rusted, and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire.  You've heaped treasure together for the last days.
 4 See, the wages of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which you've kept back by fraud, shouts, and the shouts of those who've reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabbath.
 5 You've lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton, you've nourished your hearts, like in a day of slaughter.
 6 You've condemned and killed the just, and he doesn't resist you.
 7 Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord.  See, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, and has long patience for it, until he receives the early and latter rain.
 8 You also be patient.  Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is getting near.
 9 Don't grudge against each other, brothers, so you won't be condemned, see, the judge stands at the door.
 10 Take, my brothers, the prophets, who've spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.
 11 See, we count them happy that endure.  You've heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.
 12 But above all things, my brothers, don't swear, not by heaven, nor by the earth, nor by any other oath, but let your yes be yes, and your no, no, so that you don't fall into condemnation.
 13 Is anyone among you afflicted?  Let him pray.  Is anyone merry?  Let him sing psalms.
 14 Is anyone sick among you?  Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord,
 15 And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up, and if he has committed sins, he'll be forgiven.
 16 Confess your faults to each other, and pray for each other so you'll be healed.  The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man is does a lot of good.
 17 Elijah was a man subject to the same kind of passions that we are, and he prayed earnestly that it wouldn't rain, and it didn't rain on the earth for three years and six months.
 18 And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.
 19 Brothers, if any of you strays from the truth, and someone converts him,
 20 Let him know, that he that converts the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.