A Programming Language


A Programming Language

(language)(APL) A language designed originally by Ken Iversonat Harvard University in 1957-1960 as a notation for theconcise expression of mathematical algorithms. It wentunnamed (or just called Iverson's Language) andunimplemented for many years. Finally a subset, APL\\360, wasimplemented in 1964.

APL is an interactive array-oriented language andprogramming environment with many innovative features. It wasoriginally written using a non-standard character set.

It is dynamically typed with dynamic scope. APLintroduced several functional forms but is not purely functional.

Dyadic Systems APL/W is one of the languages that will beavailable under Microsoft's .NET initative.

ISO 8485 is the 1989 standard defining the language.

Versions: APL\\360, APL SV, Dyalog APL, VS APL, Sharp APL,Sharp APL/PC, APL*PLUS, APL*PLUS/PC, APL*PLUS/PC II, MCM APL,Honeyapple, DEC APL, Cognos APL2000, IBM APL2.

See also Kamin's interpreters.

APLWEB translates WEB to APL.

Dijkstra said that APL was a language designed to perfection- in the wrong direction.

["A Programming Language", Kenneth E. Iverson, Wiley, 1962].

["APL: An Interactive Approach", 1976].