Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!gatech!udel!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh From: wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison) Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: Re: Algol-68 down for the count (was: Why have FORTRAN 8x at all?) Summary: semantics: definition of success/failure Message-ID: <406@ubbpc.UUCP> Date: 28 Nov 88 13:59:33 GMT References: <388@ubbpc.UUCP> <16187@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <599@quintus.UUCP> <7724@boring.cwi.nl> Organization: UNISYS CS, Blue Bell, PA Lines: 51 In article <7724@boring.cwi.nl>, dik@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter) writes: > In article <404@ubbpc.UUCP> wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison) writes: > > In article <591@tuck.nott-cs.UUCP>, anw@nott-cs.UUCP writes: > > > [ Andy Walker rebutted that his institution, Nottingham U, UK, used ] > > > [ Algol68 A WHOLE LOT, and they liked it A WHOLE LOT ] > > Andy, I now know of 2 (two) institutions that ever tried to use Algol-68 > > seriously, yours, and Math. Centrum in Amsterdam. > > If that is not an embarrassing debacle for a language design, what > > is? Ten million computer owners elected not to use Algol-68, and (order of > > magnitude) 2 institutions chose to use it. > Strange that a (semi-commercial) corporation like NAG has produced a complete > numerical library for Algol-68 if only 2 institutes used it! Thanks for the update. Before we get embroiled in a meaningless argument, let me point out that there are at least two criteria for success of a programming language: success-1: having lots of neat design ideas, and success-2: being widely adopted. So Algol-60 had success-1, but failure-2, since it never caught on outside of Europe. I thought of Algol-68 as failure-1 (because of the baroque, unusable language spec), and failure-2 (because a negligible part of the computer community uses it). Enough people have responded that I may revise my opinion and decide that Algol-68 had success-1, but there is no evidence that it had success-2. Here are some more opinions: Ada success-1? failure-2? small group (Ichbiah & Co.)? Algol-60 success-1 failure-2 small group Algol-68 success-1?? failure-2 committee C success-1 success-2 small group COBOL failure-1 success-2 committee FORTRAN failure-1 success-2 small group FORTH failure-1 success-2? small group LISP success-1 failure-2(this is changing) small group Modula2 success-1 success-2 small group Pascal success-1 success-2 small group PL/I failure-1 failure-2 large committee (I need more info about Ada: did a small group around Ichbiah define most of the language, or does it qualify as a committee design? Also, I do not honestly know if Ada qualifies as a success yet.) I still maintain that this supports my earlier thesis: that committee- designed languages fail and individually-designed languages succeed. Now that I have defined success and failure more clearly, more people might agree. -- Bill Hutchison, DP Consultant rutgers!liberty!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh Unisys UNIX Portation Center "What one fool can do, another can!" P.O. Box 500, M.S. B121 Ancient Simian Proverb, quoted by Blue Bell, PA 19424 Sylvanus P. Thompson, in _Calculus Made Easy_