↑ It or Leave It in Dyalog APL/W

Transcribed from the printed issue; not yet reviewed. Read it in the PDF of the issue, page 129

I apologize for not having made use of your VectorAPL font, but please, read on.

This text was made in Windows Write. I feel normal, I look normal, so I think I’m normal, in spite of the facts that I’ve studied actuarial sciences and that I’m using APL for my work. For a normal person the normal way to get the ↑ on your screen, and — thanks to TrueType — on your print apart from APL is by Windows Write. You can’t get it in Word for Windows (they say because there is one position in the character set in Word for Windows, which is reserved for a fixed space) and there is no way to trick Word for Windows. You can’t get your ↑ in WordPerfect for Windows either (a conspiracy?), but there is a way to trick WordPerfect for Windows: paste your ↑ in Windows Write (here you must first pick your DyalogAPL font before pasting, otherwise you’re losing your ↑), cut or copy your ↑ in Windows Write and finally paste your ↑ in WordPerfect for Windows. Some people suggest you make your own font (some are surprised how easy that is) and others are suggesting you request a special VectorAPL font (then you definitely will lose some other character; and even if that character is your APL space you still lose it) and have a runtime Dyalog APL interpreter of about 1M bytes for free. Is that the way to do it?

I have to endure crashes during Microsoft Windows sessions once or twice a week, if not a day, because of its instability. Yes, Microsoft is bigger than we are. If you click on ‘Font’ or ‘Character’ in one of your favourite word processors for Windows you’ll find an abundance of the most crazy and — to me — silly characters, while we aren’t able to design one single properly working font for our daily work in one of the oldest computer languages. How patient or how gullible do computer designers think a human being can be?

I had expected the following: PostScript, the end of the most persistent obstacle, and then I thought: TrueType, even better, the real end of the nastiest problem. After 27 years we still have to beg for conformity (Gfeller & Kromberg) in not only one of the oldest computer languages, but in my view still the most promising one … were it not that we can’t even display our ↑. The time I’ve spent on these exercises (for some people a feast — for me just a nuisance) is humiliating.

Or is it the sound of the apocalyptic cavalry behind the APL-hills: ↑ it or ↓ it?

I often feel like Bill Cosby’s portrait of Noah when he let him answer his neighbour’s question about what an Ark might be: "How long can you tread water?" I’m not drowning yet!

I think APL is still there thanks to its mathematical consistency and in spite of … well, let’s see what happens.

Jan Karman

[Vector Production — use <Insert Symbol> from normal text having first selected the DyalogAPL font — this is the only way I know to fool Word!]