A Programming Language
<language> (APL) A language designed originally by Ken Iverson at Harvard University in 1957-1960 as a notation for the concise expression of mathematical algorithms.
It went unnamed (or just called
Iverson's Language) and unimplemented for many years.
Finally a subset, APL\360, was implemented in 1964.
APL is an
interactive array-oriented language and programming environment with many innovative features.
It was originally written using a non-standard
character set.
It is
dynamically typed with
dynamic scope.
APL introduced several functional forms but is not purely functional.
Dyadic Systems {APL/W} is one of the languages that will be available 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 (http://www.apl2000.com/), 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].
