Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!ubc-cs!alberta!calgary!cpsc!lauch
From: lauch@cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Christopher Lau)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: What languages do you want.
Summary: APL, LISP
Keywords: APL, LISP
Message-ID: <1684@cs-spool.calgary.UUCP>
Date: 10 Aug 89 02:00:04 GMT
References:  <8908042018.aa02544@SMOKE.BRL.MIL>
Sender: news@calgary.UUCP
Reply-To: lauch@vaxa.UUCP (Christopher Lau)
Organization: U. of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Lines: 49

In article <8908042018.aa02544@SMOKE.BRL.MIL> STEIN@UCONNVM.BITNET (Alan Stein) writes:
>>How about an APL?   I think the Apple II and its operating system have
>>grown up enough to make a practical APL possible on the II.   We have
>>a potentially huge memory space (up to 8 megabytes), standardized font
>>management (APL uses a unique font) and some sophisticated development
>>environments to write it in.
>>
>>Seymour
>
>  I agree.  BTW, does anyone know whether there is an APL font available
>for the IIGS?
>
>
>Alan H. Stein              | stein@uconnvm.bitnet
>Department of Mathematics  | stein%uconnvm.bitnet@mitvma.mit.edu
>University of Connecticut  | ...psuvax1!UCONNVM.BITNET!STEIN
>32 Hillside Avenue         |
>Waterbury, CT 06710        | Compu$erve  71545,1500
>(203) 757-1231             | GEnie       ah.stein


Well, I'm working on an APL interpreter for the Apple // series..   I'm
currently writing it in Pascal (Kyan version 2.0).   I haven't worked out
the graphic character set yet, (I'm using ctrl-n to switch between charsets
and then using a picture of the keyboard with the APL symbols.  This is
admittedly clumsy (and hard to edit because you can't tell if a char is an
overstrike (only the strikeover char is shown..  what do you expect in text??)
but amazingly, it actually works)..  I may, if I really get ambitious, make
use of the graphics capabilities of Kyan pascal and make a graphic charset
If not, I'll probably go the route of the dot-commands (.iota etc).
Currently, the source is around 8 pages long, but it executes quite fast
(not even as fast as Applesoft, but for an interpreter written in a rather
inefficient compiled language, I'm quite pleased..)
I suppose, once I complete it, I'll make it shareware for $20 or something
and let someone make a GS-only version with Orca Pascal or the like..

I've also got a Lisp interpreter in the works, but that will take some more
time..  (Do you know how hard it is to implement a good LIST structure in
either C or Pascal??)

Chris Lau
Software Design Engineer
NovAtel Communications Ltd. 


Replies->  If it's interesting, post it to the newsgroup.  If not,
	   CYLau@UNCAMULT.BITNET
	   lauch!vaxa@cpsc.ucalgary.ca
Disclaimer-> I didn't say it, the computer did!