Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!psuvax1!vu-vlsi!mckee
From: mckee@vu-vlsi.Villanova.EDU (Bruce McKee)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.apl
Subject: Re: Is APL a dying language?
Summary: There are several non-STSC APL's for the Macintosh
Message-ID: <2044@vu-vlsi.Villanova.EDU>
Date: 2 Dec 88 01:13:32 GMT
References: <13635@cisunx.UUCP> <1938@water.waterloo.edu> <723@convex.UUCP> <18@kepler1.UUCP>
Organization: Villanova Univ. EE Dept.
Lines: 22

STSC is not the only source for Macintosh APLs.  Check back issues of 
MacTutor - I recall an article that listed 4-5 different products.  
There was STSC, Spencer Organization, a product called MacAPL, and some
public domain product from France.  The article talked about STSC's APL in the most detail, but gave references to the other entries.

Regarding: "Is APL a dying language"?  I disagree.  
I learned APL back in 1985, and I find it invaluable as both a prototyping 
language and a way of thinking, particularly if you must map algorithms onto
parallel hardware (SIMD machines, array processors, etc.).  For example, the
Connection Machine has certain operations that nicely map into APL operators.
Result:  algorithms prototyped in APL can be easily re-written in parallel C 
and Fortran. 

APL would go much further if there were standard ASCII keywords for each
operator (I can type words faster than remembering the symbol positions).
Also needed are standard graphics and math libraries. These additions 
would greatly improve APL's acceptance.  

-Bruce McKee
Villanova University

>These are my opinions - your mileage may vary.