Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language

Brent> We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it Brent> (except for the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's Brent> regularity, but that may have something to do with it being Brent> the first structured language I experienced (various Brent> assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I believe it Brent> was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under Brent> MTS. Near Algol-68? Hm. Algol-68 was a pretty rare beast, and quite thoroughly different from Algol-60. Much harder to implement, too. (Then again... I have alisting -- tech report -- of an Algol-68 interpreter written in Algol-60. Maybe I should scan that one?) Brent> PASCAL was used in 2nd year - seemed like a step backwards. Hm, I wouldn't have said that. Did a bunch in Algol-60 (my first language, too) and some years later in Pascal, having traveled through Fortran and Basic and PL/I in between. I would say Pascal is every bit as good as Algol-60 -- a few missing things added, and a few mistakes removed. Both have sane syntax, quite unlike the absurdities of C, or (almost but not quite as bad) PL/I. paul