FORTRAN: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 15:19, 26 March 2018

Early and highly influential programming language designed by IBM in the 1950's, by now primarily used in numerical and scientific computing but on top of the usual inertia and the wide availability of libraries. FORTRAN can produce numerical code that is significantly faster that what you can expect from languages like C and Pascal and I/O speed, especially registered I/O is in a whole different league to CPL class languages like C and C++. While Fortran was a major influence on the European Algol languages in the late 1950's, things have essentially turned around 180 degrees with all FORTRAN standards since the early 70's being heavily influenced by structured Algol derivatives like Pascal and Modula-2.

Classic FORTRAN is always spelled all caps, Fortran 90 and later however are expected to be formatted as other nouns. We tend to use the older conventions here since only a couple of F90 OS/2 implementations showed up and they did not sell well so the bulk of OS/2 programming has traditionally been done in classic FORTRAN.

History

Developed primarily by John Backus then working from the IBM headquarters on Madison Avenue in New York City, USA and formally introduced as an optional software for the IBM 704 computer in April 1957 even though IBM had shipped versions in 1956. The basic idea behind FORTRAN was for it to resemble common algebra notation as much as possible.

1958: FORTRAN II
1962: FORTRAN IV

Standards

FORTRAN66: ANSI FORTRAN 66 Standard - (X3.9-1966) 1967 - Basically a rubber stamping of FORTRAN IV with some clarifications.
FORTRAN-77: X3.9-1978
Fortran 90: ISO/IEC 1539:1991
Fortran 95: ISO/IEC 1539-1:1997
Fortran 2003: ISO/IEC 1539-1:2004
Fortran 2008: ISO/IEC 1539-1:2010; Draft Fortran2008 - Minor revision of 2003

Standards bodies

Fortran Standards Committee homepage - The home of FORTRAN standardisation since 1966, although usually credited to ANSI the standard is actually developed by "National Committee for Information Technology Standards" (NCITS) nowadays known as "InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards " (INCITS), despite having no presence outside the USA.

Source code snippets, archives and collections

Small programs or routines that you can integrate into your own programs or study to learn from, but are not delivered in library form.

Harold Zbiegien's date algorithms

Publications

John Backus, et al: FORTRAN Automated Coding System For the IBM 704 EDPM - 1956

Links

USENET: comp.lang.fortran - Surprisingly popular

@@ Line 5: / Line 5: @@
 ==History==
 Developed primarily by John Backus then working from the IBM headquarters on Madison Avenue in New York City, USA and formally introduced as an optional software for the IBM 704 computer in April 1957 even though IBM had shipped versions in 1956. The basic idea behind FORTRAN was for it to resemble common algebra notation as much as possible.
+*1958: [[FORTRAN II]]
+*1962: [[FORTRAN IV]]
+===Standards===
+;FORTRAN66:[http://www.fh-jena.de/~kleine/history/languages/ansi-x3dot9-1966-Fortran66.pdf ANSI FORTRAN 66 Standard] - (X3.9-1966) 1967 - Basically a rubber stamping of FORTRAN IV with some clarifications.
+;[[FORTRAN-77]]:X3.9-1978
+;[[Fortran 90]]:ISO/IEC 1539:1991
+;[[Fortran 95]]:ISO/IEC 1539-1:1997
+;[[Fortran 2003]]:ISO/IEC 1539-1:2004
+;Fortran 2008:ISO/IEC 1539-1:2010
+:[ftp://ftp.nag.co.uk/sc22wg5/N1801-N1850/N1830.pdf Draft Fortran2008] - Minor revision of 2003
+;Standards bodies
+* [http://www.j3-fortran.org/ Fortran Standards Committee homepage] - The home of FORTRAN standardisation since 1966, although usually credited to ANSI the standard is actually developed by "National Committee for Information Technology Standards" (NCITS) nowadays known as "InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards " (INCITS), despite having no presence outside the USA.
 ==Source code snippets, archives and collections==
@@ Line 11: / Line 26: @@
 ==Publications==
-* T. Ellis, et al: ''FORTRAN 77 Programming: with an Introduction to the FORTRAN 90 Standard''  - 1990, ISBN 0-201-41638-7
+* John Backus, et al: [http://www.fh-jena.de/~kleine/history/languages/FortranAutomaticCodingSystemForTheIBM704.pdf FORTRAN Automated Coding System For the IBM 704 EDPM] - 1956
-* [[Bertrand Meyer]]: "Principles of Package Design" - Communications of the ACM 25(7): 419-428 (1982)
-* Ian Chivers & Jane Sleightholme: [http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007%2F978-0-85729-233-9 Introduction to Programming with Fortran: With Coverage of Fortran 90, 95, 2003, 2008 and 77] - 2012 - ISBN 978-0-85729-232-2
 ==Links==
 * USENET: [news:comp.lang.fortran comp.lang.fortran] - Surprisingly popular
-===Standards===
-;FORTRAN66
-* [http://www.fh-jena.de/~kleine/history/languages/ansi-x3dot9-1966-Fortran66.pdf ANSI FORTRAN66 Standard] - 1967 - Basically a rubber stamping of FORTRAN IV with some clarifications.
-;Fortran 2008
-* [ftp://ftp.nag.co.uk/sc22wg5/N1801-N1850/N1830.pdf Draft Fortran2008] - Minor revision of 2003
-* [http://www.j3-fortran.org/doc/standing/links/010.pdf Workplan for Fortran2015]
-;Standards bodies
-* [http://www.j3-fortran.org/ Fortran Standards Committee homepage] - The home of FORTRAN standardisation since 1966, although usually credited to ANSI the standard is actually developed by "National Committee for Information Technology Standards" (NCITS) nowadays known as "InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards " (INCITS), despite having no presence outside the USA.
 [[Category:Programming Languages]] [[Category:FORTRAN]]