APL Press Review

Transcribed from the printed issue; not yet reviewed. Read it in the PDF of the issue, page 45

To help with future press reviews, please send any cuttings which mention APL (or photocopies of them) with the date and full name of the publication written on the edge to Cuttings file, Anthony Camacho, [address omitted]. Thanks to those who have already been doing this.

The last press review appeared in April 1987 and included items up to February 1987. In theory there should be a lot more material but I have not taken it upon myself to act as cuttings agency or to look through old magazines. The items described below are just those that found their way into the Editor's cuttings file. For a more complete account next time we have to rely on you to send in the cuttings.

To summarise everything would take up far too much of Vector. We believe not many people would be interested in knowing much more than that APL is beginning to get rather more mention than it used to do. I propose to describe each cutting as briefly as it seems to deserve in approximate date order.

1987 Computer User's Year Book - Programming languages entry¶

"APL ... has spread by its intrinsic merits ... surprisingly, in view of its mathematical background, it is quite popular as a means of implementing financial and managerial problems ... arrays ... large repertoire of functions ... terse ... special characters."

1987 Excerpt from a Hewlett-Packard magazine¶

The article is called " ... Selecting a Programming Language made Easy" and begins "... we have prepared a chart that matches programming languages with comparable automobiles." Thus: "Assembler - A formula I race car. Very fast, but difficult to drive and expensive to maintain." or "COBOL - A delivery van. It's bulky and ugly but it does the work." or "Pascal - A Volkswagen beetle. It's small but sturdy. Was once popular with intellectuals." or "Logo - A kiddie's replica of a Rolls-Royce. Comes with a real engine and a working horn." or "APL - A double decker bus. It takes rows and columns of passengers to the same place all at the same time. But it drives only in reverse gear and is instrumented in Greek."

13 Feb 1987 Computerworld EXTRA - 55 col-in article by Alan John¶

Gives a little history and describes Sharp Australia's International Portfolio Management System, mentioning IBM financial services using APL and C A Reed Associates. The article makes it clear that APL is used and liked by Australian Guarantee, Ord Minnett, Morgan Stanley, Westpac, Dominguez Berry, NSW Intitute of Technology and others although it appears that Australian Bank and Commonwealth Bank may be intending to phase it out.

30 Mar 1987 Computing Australia - full page article by John Lenarcic¶

"To the uninitiated APL could be as clear as hieroglyphics but John Lenarcic throws light on its real possibilities." It begins with a little history "30,000 users [of IBM, Sharp and STSC APLs] in US including Coca-Cola and Exxon." There is then a clear exposition of some APL features, a discussion of the extended character set; advantages (brevity, no need to translate) and disadvantages (too concise for easy legibility, need special attention to provide them) and some expectation that with the arrival of cheap APLs on powerful micros APL may have found a niche. APL is taught at The University of NSW, the NSW Institute of Technology and at Swinburne Institute of Technology. The prestigious APL88 International Conference will be held in Sydney from 1 to 5 February 1988.

14 May 1987 Computing - review of Murray & Pappas book¶

The reviewer, David Albury, says the book is well written and easy to follow, concluding "Certainly APL is an interesting development and it will be interesting to see just how fast it catches on." There is another review in Vector 4.3.

May 1987 Acorn User - 2.5 col-in on I-APL¶

This gives the bare details and address to write to if you are interested on I-APL for the BBC.

May 1987 Micro User - 9 col-in on I-APL 'APL version for BBC'¶

"The preferred language for internal development at IBM for 20 years, APL can now be shoehorned into a [school] microcomputer. I-APL will be demonstrated at Dallas this month. It will conform to the ISO standard and we hope it will lead to some of the more go-ahead schools using it. There will be no charge for software - only for manuals and copying.

11 June 1987 Computing - 10 col-in stimulated by Vector Editorial¶

"A British Computer Society working group is fighting a lonely battle to enlighten the world on the benefits of the APL programming language." Mainly negative comment - "got a bad reputation", "expensive", "takes much longer to use it".

25 June 1987 Computing - BAA summer school and I-APL¶

The British APL Association is helping to pay for a weekend summer school to encourage wider interest in APL among UK maths teachers. "I-APL has raised £20,000 to pay for an interpreter on a number of popular microcomputers ... BBC, Spectrum and Atari ST as well as IBM PCs and compatibles."

29 June 1987 Datalink - front col 'APL challenges BASIC in schools'¶

This describes an ambitious attempt to replace BASIC as the preferred language for schools, with assembler specialist Paul Chapman "holed up in Tooting" writing the interpreter. "The free interpreter is a key response by the APL community to the marketing failure which, they admit, has cast a shadow over the future of the language. "I-APL may be a breakthrough in awareness in schools."

20 July 1987 Datalink - full page article by Anthony Camacho¶

Not just another programming language, APL is a notation and it allows people to think in parallel. The search for a precise way to specify processes using ordinary English will fail just as the law has failed. It will always be necessary to think. The article restates some APL advantages while acknowledging that bad APL can be as horrible as bad BASIC. APL is simply the best way of doing mathematics on a computer.

Sept 1987 Practical Computing - 3.5 col-in assessment of APL¶

A really incompetent piece of work. I wrote to the Editor but he didn't print my letter. "Excellent data type specification. Does not handle high volumes of data very well." The author made it up because there wasn't a book in the library.

Sept 1987 Personal Computer World - 2.5 col-in about I-APL¶

Headed "Enthusiasm wins" this gives the bare facts and the address to write to for a copy of I-APL.

Nov 1987 Comms of the ACM - 10 col-in letter from J P Pastinelli¶

A response to an article in which GOTO is considered harmful, this letter gives a one line solution to a problem from the article - find in a matrix how many all-zero rows (if any) there are before the first non-zero row (or the end). The solution is wittily explained.

1 Jan 1988 Times Ed Supp - 4 column-inches about I-APL¶

"I-APL claims to be the first all-machine truly portable language." BBC B programs wil produce the same results on IBM Mainframe, Sinclair Spectrum, Amiga, AppleII, Amstrads, Atari ST, Archimedes, PC clones and CP/M machines. "A gallon in a pint pot and not a drop spilt." I-APL fits into 26K and will be free: the only charges are for copying and the manuals. Address for enquiries given.

9 Feb 1988 The Australian - 15 column inches about APL & Iverson¶

"In one of the twists of irony so often seen in the computer industry, a computer language primarily developed for teaching mathematics was shunned by academics and taken up by the financial industry." Ken Iverson was interviewed about his efforts to introduce APL into Canadian schools - he got in a good plug for his method of teaching APL and the I-APL project also gets a mention.

Feb 1988 Computer Education - 1.5 page article by Jill Moss¶

APL is different because it was originally a notation. It uses symbols for functions like mathematics and handles vectors and matrices. It is easy to learn and people who have used it a lot find they can think with it. APL is the best way of teaching maths on a computer. It is not just academic: APL is used by half of the top 100 companies - and Jill Moss gives some simple examples of what such companies use APL for. I-APL gets a mention (with the address) and so does a BAA scheme to provide mentors (free advisers from the association) for schools. The recent summer school at Winchester, arranged and run by Norman Thomson, is described with a picture of Norman and Sue Fratter who won the free APL computer (an IBM 5110) at the course. The BCS address is given for queries and follow-up.

Feb 1988 Electronics and Wireless World - 8 col-in about I-APL¶

Under the heading "International programming language" this puts the I-APL press releases into Electronics and Wireless world's own words. The ideas of portability, a notation, home and school machines, fast programming and ISO conformance are all covered. Professors Hawkes and Spence are mentioned and also the fact that we charge for manuals and copying but the software is free.

25 Feb 1988 Computing - 3.5 col-in about APL as a control language¶

Richard Sharpe's column is about the results of a Grand Prix for fourth generation languages. Problems arise when there is no clear best choice. "A second problem ... is that the language APL did rather well. 217 points from the tests of flexibility - more than four of the 4GLs. Its strength in the Grand Prix highlights a central problem about languages. The constructs and how you can use them in APL are very powerful. However there is nothing in APL that forces structured coding, remarking or explicit data typing and verification." [I'm afraid the world thinks such attributes are valuable - without them, as he says, you cannot distinguish a coding mistake from an error in specification.]

7 March 1988 Datalink - 8.5 col-in front page 'Sharp looks to Unix APL'¶

Under a picture of Ken Iverson, the article says "A new phase in the evolution of the APL language has been initiated by leading APL firm I P Sharp. ... I P Sharp has unveiled APL/UX ... targeted at unix workstations ... the most powerful APL yet written ... it is the closest ... to the ideal APL as defined by the language's inventor Ken Iverson."

17 March 1988 Computing - 30 col-in letter from A J Camacho & picture¶

Under the heading "Call for robust self-discipline" this thanks Sharpe (25 Feb) for reporting a favourable analysis of APL and suggests that the gain in flexibility from weak typing is worth more than any benefit which may arise from strong typing. It says that there is no language which forces structured coding, but, if you stick to direct definition in APL (available 'free' from I-APL), that makes it almost impossible to write Spaghetti-BASIC programs. The address for order forms is given. The picture is a plate of spaghetti with the caption "Direct definition in APL could turn even the most basic spaghetti into a structured program" - if only it could!

April 1988 Micro User - 5.5 col-in about I-APL¶

The first all-machine truly portable computer language - I-APL - is nearing completion. Mainframe APLs are over 400K bytes of code; I-APL runs in less than 26K. The magazine is, of course, interested mainly in the BBC B version.