Author: Christophe Theron
Date: 18:01:52 02/05/04
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On February 05, 2004 at 14:57:32, Bob Durrett wrote: > >Quote from an MSNBC article: > >Forty-seven years after IBM unleashed it, Fortran (formula translation), the >original “high-level” programming language, would seem to be the infotech >equivalent of cuneiform. But it’s still widely used, especially in scientific >computing. Why has this Eisenhower-era veteran outlasted so many hardware and >software generations? “It’s partly the learning curve,” says Hewlett-Packard >Laboratories’ Hans Boehm, former chair of the Association for Computing >Research’s special-interest group on programming languages. “For some people >it’s good enough, and it’s hard to let go of something once you learn it.” >Adaptability and compatibility, which made Fortran the programmers’ lingua >franca in the 1960s and ’70s, are also key to its viability. Major upgrades have >boosted efficiency and added features while preserving old versions intact. So a >vast number of tried-and-true Fortran 77 programs jibe with the current Fortran >90. Microsoft, take note. > >Maybe chess programmers are missing out on the best language of all! > >Bob D. "Chess", the mythical chess program of the '70 programmed by Slate and Atkins, was programmed in Fortran. I think it was a bitboard program. Bob will tell me if the above is incorrect (most probably it is incomplete). Christophe
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