[COFF] Joys of PL/I [Was: Re: [TUHS] Book Recommendation]

[Nemo Nusquam]

On 2021-11-16 09:57, Douglas McIlroy wrote:
> The following remark stirred old memories. Apologies for straying off
> the path of TUHS.
>
>> I have gotten the impression that [PL/I] was a language that was beloved by no one.
> As I was a designer of PL/I, an implementer of EPL (the preliminary
> PL/I compiler used to build Multics), and author of the first PL/I
> program to appear in the ACM Collected Algorithms, it's a bit hard to
> admit that PL/I was "insignificant". I'm proud, though, of having
> conceived the SIGNAL statement, which pioneered exception handling,
> and the USES and SETS attributes, which unfortunately sank into
> oblivion. I also spurred Bud Lawson to invent -> for pointer-chasing.
> The former notation C(B(A)) became A->B->C. This was PL/I's gift to C.
>
> After the ACM program I never wrote another line of PL/I.
> Gratification finally came forty years on when I met a retired
> programmer who, unaware of my PL/I connection, volunteered that she
> had loved PL/I above all other programming languages.

My first language was actually PL/C  (and the computer centre did not 
charge for runs in PL/C).  I needed to use PL/I for some thesis-related 
work and ran into the JLC wall -- no issues with the former, many issues 
with the latter.  One of the support people, upon learning that I was 
using PL/I, said: "PL/I's alright!"

N.

>
> Doug