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Real programmers don't write in FORTRAN. FORTRAN is for pipe stress freaks and crystallography weenies. SAYS MY Tk4- COOKIE JAR


 

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Since everyone seems to be waxing nostalgic about their programming experience these days, here's my contribution:
I started learning Fortan in 1967, which ran on the campus's IBM 7040 mainframe.? Later, the university got an IBM 360 and I learned 360 assembler language.? Later, for a programming class, I did all the programming on a Data General Nova minicomputer and learned its assembler language, which we ran on a floppy-disk-based operating system called Zbec (or something like that).?

Later, I went to work for IBM as a logic designer but ended up writing a lot of programs in 370 assembler, then PL/AS followed by PL/X.? Also wrote lots of stuff in REXX, TCL and CLIC.? CLIC (Compiled Language for Interactive Commands) is one I haven't heard anybody mention.? It was developed at IBM's San Jose facility and might have been an IBM internal-only language.? It was actually quite a powerful language but suffered somewhat from its clunky CLIST-like syntax.? CLIC programs were compiled to some kind of intermediate language, which was then executed by a CLIC executor.? There were versions of CLIC for both MVS and VM.? CLIC was pulled off the IBM mainframes around 1999 when it was discovered that it was not Y2K compliant and they had no motivation to fix it and the world was suffering from Y2K paranoia.

My favorite language for many years was PL/X.? I wrote many ISPF dialogs in PL/X to interface with the many EDA tools we used.? I still have a version of PL/X for OS/2 on my vintage PC running OS/2 Warp.

Of course, as a logic designer, I had to learn various EDA-oriented languages: BDL/S, BDL/C, EPL/S, TDL (Tucson Design Language) and finally VHDL and Verilog.

Charles Bailey
(now out of retirement, working for IBM again, and coding more VHDL, Verilog, TCL, and 2 weeks ago, a program in REXX to extract some data from a Verilog netlist.)

On 2020-11-28 15:31, Ed Liss wrote:

I had many favorites over the years.? Fortran IV was the first.? That then shifted for SPS (IBM 1620 assembler) and then to BAL (S/360).? PL/I was lurking in the background before it finally emerged to become the "bill payer".? I never liked COBOL but it was a "bill payer".? Hate RPG.? Today my favorite is Visual Studio (Basic).? I am dabling with Netbeans (Java) but I don't think it is all that great.
_._,_._,_



 

I still find myself thinking of the underlying assembly, even when I'm using a compiled language :-)
All programmers should think about what their higher level constructs and statements are doing to the hw.


 

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Folks,

Well for a long time we bashed, bent stretched and squished FORTRAN into various distortions because we had no other language.

?

When I worked on Networking software for Salford University for UK Universities, we wrote much of it in Fortran 77. It was not an ideal language, BUT FORTRAN 77 was the one language every University had. It would probably have been much nicer in “C” but even if the Universities owned “C” it was probably a different flavour in each University. Generally on a particular platform they all had the Vendors FORTRAN 77. So DEC VAX users had DEC Fortran, IBM users VS Fortran, Honeywell users, Honeywell Fortran. The exception was PR1ME. Salford had PR1MES and when they were benchmarked the Fortran77 compiler was not available, so the benchmarks were don with Fortran 66. When PR1ME’s Fortran 77 was delivered, it was, to put it mildly a “right dogs dinner”.

?

Oddly Salford had written a FORTRAN 77 compiler.

?

From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of sfbusfbu
Sent: 29 November 2020 01:04
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [H390-MVS] Real programmers don't write in FORTRAN. FORTRAN is for pipe stress freaks and crystallography weenies. SAYS MY Tk4- COOKIE JAR

?

I still find myself thinking of the underlying assembly, even when I'm using a compiled language :-)

All programmers should think about what their higher level constructs and statements are doing to the hw.


 

开云体育

<< let me fix this>>

?

Folks,

Well for a long time we bashed, bent stretched and squished FORTRAN into various distortions because we had no other language. Even the folks behind “C” and Unix recognized this and produced RATFOR for those of us stuck with FORTRAN.

?

When I worked on Networking software for Salford University for UK Universities, we wrote much of it in Fortran 77. It was not an ideal language, BUT FORTRAN 77 was the one language every UK University had. It would probably have been much nicer in “C” but even if the Universities owned “C” it was probably a different flavour in each University. The University had already written a Fortran 77 compiler in Fortran 77 so we re-used some of the techniques to build X25 Networking code which ran on MVS, VM, PRIMOS plus a few others.

?

It was a challenge, so we had a macro processor that allowed us to create our main program as a basic message switch. Then because we had no dynamic storage, we had a vector of 256 byte strings that was used for storing “control information”. So for example for a file transfer there would be one character string containing information about the source file, one for the destination file. The locations within each string were defined by constants read by include file.

There was a matching array of integers which allowed each the strings to be chained together, and the type of each string to be defined…

?

As for Fortran 77, generally on a particular platform they all had the Vendors FORTRAN 77. So DEC VAX users had DEC Fortran, IBM users VS Fortran, Honeywell users, Honeywell Fortran. The exception was PR1ME. Salford had PR1MES and when they were benchmarked the Fortran77 compiler was not available, so the benchmarks were don with Fortran 66. When PR1ME’s Fortran 77 was delivered, it was, to put it mildly a “right dog’s dinner”. Salford’s had written a FORTRAN 77 compiler for the ICL1900. In those days UK University computers were supposed to last 10 years, so although ICL replaced the ICL1900 hardware with a 2900 emulating the 1900, they made them keep the old software so only Fortran 66. So they wrote a Fortran 77 compiler as a stop gap. When PR1ME FORTRAN 77 was found to be terrible it was ported to PR1MOS. Later it was ported to MSDOS as FTN77. Today its still available, upgraded Fortran 95 as SilverFrost FTN85….

?

Dave

G4UGM

?

From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of sfbusfbu
Sent: 29 November 2020 01:04
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [H390-MVS] Real programmers don't write in FORTRAN. FORTRAN is for pipe stress freaks and crystallography weenies. SAYS MY Tk4- COOKIE JAR

?

I still find myself thinking of the underlying assembly, even when I'm using a compiled language :-)

All programmers should think about what their higher level constructs and statements are doing to the hw.


 

On Sun, 29 Nov 2020 15:07:50 -0000, "Dave Wade" <dave.g4ugm@...>
wrote:


<< let me fix this>>



Folks,

Well for a long time we bashed, bent stretched and squished FORTRAN
into various distortions because we had no other language. Even the
folks behind “C” and Unix recognized this and produced RATFOR for
those of us stuck with FORTRAN.
I use to think that the best programming language is, first of all,
the one that is available. If more than one is available, the better
is the one that:

1- Gets the work done in an useful way.

2- I am more familiar with.


Once I was in a field operation (199x, no net, no telephony, and
hours flight away from any civilization) and had the need to have a
program just to compare two CSV files. About 15 columns and 200 lines.
The only available language was the ms-basic available in a Windows
<something>. In 15 minutes I had a first program that were doing in
two seconds what people was doing in almost one hour. And making
mistakes doing that.

Cheers!



Roxo

--
---------------- Non luctari, ludare -------------------+ WYSIWYG
Fernando M. Roxo da Motta <mvs@...> | Editor?
Except where explicitly stated I speak on my own behalf.| VI !!
PU5RXO | I see text,
------------ Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?-------------+ I get text!


 

Fortran was ad still is a Lingua Franca un the sciences and engineerig community, INTEL in the 1970's distributed PL/M, a downsized PL/I ( it's available today ) as two pass PL/M compiler, for its micros, written in FORTRAN 77 : I mention PL/M, because the first microcomputer operating system CP/M was written in PL/M
you coud use it in most minis and mainfames of the time


 

I first learnt FORTRAN at a university holiday job in 1970, which was also my first experience of computers. They had a PDPxx (xx=10? can't remember for sure), and they gave me a copy of Daniel D. McCracken's Guide to FORTRAN IV programming, and I basically taught myself FORTRAN (I found a copy on Amazon a few years ago). I wrote a couple of programs for the job, and fortunately they worked first time - I remember thinking that if they didn't work, I would have a lot of trouble debugging them. No comments, GO TOs all over the place, variable names such as AAA, BBB, etc etc (I was yet to learn about maintainability of programs...).

Then in 1971 at university I wrote some more FORTRAN in a unit of Applied mathematics, to solve some mathematical problem (they also had a PDP (something)). I remember I didn't get all the bugs out before I had to hand it in...

In 1974 I started work at a big company which used a S360, and they taught us PL/I, the main language used there. Unlike that holiday job, they taught the importance of comments, meaningful variable names etc. I used PL/I for nearly a year.

Then I transferred to a department where Fortran was used, and I remained in that department, and it's successors (there were reorganisations about every 5 minutes, it seemed....) for the rest of my time at the company. I used both Fortran and PL/I, and occasionally MARK IV, and eventually (after other staff left and the department didn't use so much Fortran) I became the de facto Fortran "go-to" person. When Fortran 77 (VS Fortran) arrived I did most of the testing for it.

I have always liked Fortran, and it is my favourite programming language.

I don't have much experience of programming languages on the PC. I could never quite get the hang of Visual Basic, with all it's objects, methods, properties etc etc, and I know nothing whatsoever about C. But I've used AutoIt (a bit like a simplified VB) a bit, and find it useful for a few things on my PC.

Tim




On Saturday, 28 November 2020, 1:21:24 am AEDT, carlos feldman <carlfelster@...> wrote:


BUT..................

As an engineer and also a programmer, I love Fortran, PL/I, C, and even Quick Basic.

But I despise Java, Prolog, Lisp

?

What are your programming likes and dislikes ?


 

Learned FORTRAN on an 1130 at my Dad's workplace on the weekends around 1970. Still play with the simulator.

Learned 8080 assembler on my own on Dad's CP/M system. Went to UIUC in the late 70s, had classes in WATFIV, PL/C, Cobol on a 360, and FORTRAN and Pascal on the CDC Cyber 175. Learned 360 assembler while porting CSO's MVT from a 360/75 to running under VM on a 4341.

Made a living with TI 990/9900 Basic, FORTRAN, and assembler, TI 960 assembler, VAX/VMS assembler, VMS FORTRAN, VMS Pascal, PDP/11 RSX FORTRAN, Perl, Turbo Pascal and successors, Java in a pile of environments, Python in a few places (Linux/x86, AWS, ESP8266, ESP32), C in a variety of places (RS/6000, Linux/x86, PIC16, ESP8266, ESP32).

My favorites ended up being Java and Python, but still like to play with the old stuff (doing the Mandelbrot set in Fortran and PL/I on MVS 3.8J, for example).

I'm probably a pariah in this group now. I used the 'J' word :)


 

WOW !!! you are a second generation programmer !!! Not so much people can say that. My Old Man, was in Radio, so i inherited electronics, but I'm the first one in programming bussiness. But he did machine automation with relay and pneumatic devices im the 60's , that is much close to programming.

At my work we have from Cobol, to support bank operations in Spain, to Java for mobile communication devices. As to myself? my weapon of choice is C or C++. But with Covid stay at home, I practized a lot with PL/I (again ).

?Regards,

Carlos?