On 01/04/2019 09:34 AM, Avi Gross wrote:
Although I used FORTRAN ages ago and it still seems to be in active use, I am
not clear on why the name FORMULA TRANSLATOR was chosen. I do agree it does
sound more like a computer language based on both the sound and feel of FORTRAN
as well as the expanded version.
It made sense at the time. I first learned FORTRAN in 1965 in
engineering school. At that time 'computer science' was in its infancy
and our everyday tool was a slide rule. The computer, an IBM System
360/30, was seen as another useful tool and engineers should learn to
translate their formulas into a form acceptable to it. You wrote your
efforts on coding forms, laboriously transferred those to punch cards,
and offered your deck up to the priests who fed it to the god visible
behind plate glass in his air conditioned lair.
http://www.lib.rpi.edu/dept/library/html/Archives//buildings/chapel.html
When I was there the chapel was still the library and the computer was
in a modern building but finally the new god was moved to a suitable house.
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