Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!polyof!kepler1!rjfrey
From: rjfrey@kepler1.UUCP (Robert J Frey)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.apl
Subject: Re: Is APL a dying language?
Summary: APL not dying,but underutilized.
Keywords: APL
Message-ID: <16@kepler1.UUCP>
Date: 19 Nov 88 09:01:34 GMT
References: <13635@cisunx.UUCP> <1938@water.waterloo.edu> <723@convex.UUCP>
Reply-To: rjfrey@kepler1.UUCP (Robert J Frey)
Organization: Kepler Financial Mgmt, Setauket, NY
Lines: 28

In article <723@convex.UUCP> mercer@mozart.UUCP (Randall Mercer) writes:
>
>Is APL a dying language?

Not for me it's not!  I was first exposed to APL on an old IBM 5100 "portable"
computer over a decade ago.  Since then it has remained my language of choice.
I'm a mathematician by training and find APL the most natural tool for express-
ing and implementing my ideas.  Prototyping is extremely rapid, and once one
gets used to it APL is quite "readable" and maintainable.

Modern versions such as IBM's APL2 or Dyalog APL which implement nested arrays,
user-defined operators and similar extensions are extremely powerful languages
capable of both numerical and symbolic processing of great generality.  Within
IBM many people are using APL2 in their AI work.  I've done a fair amount of
Lisp programming myself and would be hard-pressed to find a example of some-
thing in Lisp that would be more difficult to implement in APL2.

Right now I'm using Dyalog APL.  It's optimized for a UNIX environment, and,
unlike many APL's, it is easy to link in external routines and escape to
the operating system when you need to.  

==============================================================================
|Dr. Robert J. Frey               | {icus, spl1, dasys1}!acsm!kepler1!rjfrey |
|Kepler Financial Management, Ltd.|------------------------------------------|
|100 North Country Rd., Bldg. B   | The views expressed are wholly my own and|
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