On Sun, May 17, 2020, DL Neil via Python-list wrote: >ALGOL 60 at 60: The greatest computer language you've never used and >grandaddy of the programming family tree >Back to the time when tape was king >By Richard Speed 15 May 2020 at 09:47 >https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/15/algol_60_at_60/
Boy does that bring back some memories :-). ALGOL was the third programming language I learned after FORTRAN and Assembly on the Bendix G-20 in early 1966. I first learned ALGOL on G.E. time sharing, where input was paper tape, although it didn't require loading the compilers from tape so I never hat that pleasure. I loved the block structure of ALGOL, and started indenting FORTRAN so that the program logic stood out even if FORTRAN didn't understand it. ... >ALGOL was almost 'the machine language' for the Burroughs B6700 series (and >similar) but concurring with the article, we regarded it as somewhat academic >and majored in FORTRAN, COBOL, or both. (as distinct from those who defined >ComSc as compiler writing, for whom ALGOL was a brilliant tool!) I really got into ALGOL on a time sharing system using the Burroughs B-5500 where ALGOL was the system's native language, there was no Assembly Language per-se. The OS MCP, (Master Control Progam) was written entirely in ALGOL. The FORTRAN compiler generated ALGOL source, and I learned a lot looking at the ALGOL output of the FORTRAN program. Many of the programming methods I use today have their roots in doing a lot of scientific programming in ALGOL on the B-5500, then in BPL (Burroughs Programming Language) on Burroughs Medium Systems, B-2500->B-4500. Bill -- INTERNET: b...@celestial.com Bill Campbell; Celestial Software LLC URL: http://www2.celestial.com/ 6641 E. Mercer Way Mobile: (206) 947-5591 PO Box 820 Fax: (206) 232-9186 Mercer Island, WA 98040-0820 In free governments the rulers are the servants, and the people their superiors & sovereigns." -- Benjamin Franklin -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
