APL\360

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 1/29/21 7:27 AM, Gavin Scott via cctalk wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 29, 2021 at 6:11 AM Peter Corlett via cctalk
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>> Secondly, beyond BODMAS, the meaning and precedence of random symbols is
>> unclear to casual readers.
> 
> An issue that plagues other operator-rich languages, but not APL since
> APL follows a strict right-to-left evaluation order for ALL operators
> (no BODMAS in sight). You can use parentheses to affect it, but it's
> not as hard to figure out a complex APL expression as one might
> naively expect at first glance.
> 
> The symbols did greatly limit the growth of APL in its early years
> just because it made the cost of entry higher so not as many people
> were exposed to it, and it also suffered the related "small
> proprietary language" issue that has plagued pretty much every
> language whose developers tried to get rich off the language itself.
> 

Curiously, in the very early 80's, it was the language of choice for
teaching computers at Marist College.  My understanding of the symbols
was that they are quite explanatory to a mathematician.  While I don't
have them in my head as most of the APL's I used worked on ASCII
terminals using Di-graphs and Tri-graphs, I can still understand and
even write APL.  It's fun to play with every once in a while.

bill