Programmierten

Programmierten is a German verb form derived from programmieren, meaning to program. It serves as the simple past (Präteritum) for the third person plural and for the formal address in the present tense narrative, as in sie programmierten die Software or Sie programmierten die Software. In everyday usage, it marks an action completed in the past by multiple subjects.

In addition to its finite past tense use, programmierten also appears as the past participle programmed when used attributively as an adjective before a plural noun. In this function it behaves like a participial adjective and agrees with the noun in gender, number, and case. With a definite article in the plural, the form is typically die programmierten Funktionen (the programmed functions), where the ending -en marks the plural attributive form.

What distinguishes programmierten from programmiert (the present or past participle) is its syntactic role. As a finite verb, it conjugates for person and number in the past tense. As a participial adjective, it adjectivizes the past participle programmieren, describing a noun such as Funktionen, Systeme, or Module, and it takes the appropriate adjective ending.

Common contexts involve reporting programming activity in the past or describing already-programmed components in a project. The related noun is Programmierung, and related professions include Programmierer, the programmer, and software development terms.

See also: Programmierung, Programmierer, programmieren.