Programming Language choices: Pascal, LOGO, Forth, Prolog, C (1986) [video]

[andromaton]

Jump to 13:05 (also shown on the right menu) for an intro to those languages.

The page has a link to "RUN SOFTWARE". The link opens a 'BBC Micro' emulator that runs the software shown on the thumbnail.

You can edit the program in all its 1980's Acorn Basic glory.

Btw, "Acorn" is the "A" in "ARM", as in billions of CPUs today, and the BBC Micro is the inspiration behind the Raspberry Pi.

[_0ffh]

>"Acorn" is the "A" in "ARM"

Used to be, before they changed it to "Advanced".

[richardjam73]

The Nimbus used in the C demonstration seems to be a 16bit 80186 computer. It runs DOS but is not PC compatible.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RM_Nimbus

[bitwize]

Every 80186 DOS machine was like that, the most famous one in the USA being the Tandy 2000:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tandy_2000

The Mindset was another, that languished in obscurity until a cache of them were found at Computer Reset:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindset_(computer)

The 186 had on-chip stuff (timers, an interrupt controller, and so forth) at I/O addresses where the PC had different stuff offboard, thus precluding the possibility of a 100% PC compatible 186 machine. So there were a few interesting, not-quite-PC DOS machine designs running a 186 out there.

[danjoredd]

I used to enjoy LOGO when I was a kid. Used Microworlds EX to make games. Shame it has fallen out of favor as an educational tool. Taught me a lot about scripting and paying attention to syntax.

[ksaj]

Have you seen the adult version? It's called NetLOGO and comes in both 2D and 3D forms. It is used for multi-agent modeling, which makes it ideal for things like the flocking algorithm that has multiple points all doing their own things based on a small set of rules.

https://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/index.shtml

[empressplay]

We're building a 3D game development environment that uses an enhanced version of Logo. It has 'spaces' that start out simple and get more complex.

You can check out our progress so far at https://turtlespaces.org

[jweir]

Check out QLogo, under active development.

I was teaching my daughter to program with it. Quiet fun.

https://qlogo.org

[SnowProblem]

Ray Kurzweil makes an appearance in Episode 17 talking about AI: https://clp.bbcrewind.co.uk/f3fc8a5ce91dfb847a4f91eed7ddb184

[coldcode]

I learned C in 1984 when it still primitive, played with Forth because it was cool, but used Pascal at work. Add to that the APL I briefly played with in graduate school. In those days the choice of languages was almost small enough to try all of them. Today it's impossible.

[OhMeadhbh]

wait. there was a prolog for the zx spectrum?

[YeGoblynQueenne]

"Micro-Prolog" apparently. Strange kind of Prolog without parentheses and with an "if" operator:

  X part-of bicycle if X part-of wheel

So not Edinburgh Prolog!

P.S. From Jtsummers' link, I realise Micro Prolog was the precursor of LPA Prolog, by the same company (LPA - Logic Programming Associates Ltd):

https://www.lpa.co.uk/win.htm

[Jtsummers]

https://worldofspectrum.net/item/0008429/ - Manuals and tape image for it too.

[fgmalpha]

yes. And for the BBC micro too.

[empressplay]

Logo is not an acronym. It's an abbreviation of Logos.

[sdsd]

Idk why but even highly knowledgeable people capitalize random tech words. In the Tanenbaum–Torvalds debate, Tanenbaum regularly calls it LINUX (maybe a habit because UNIX is smallcaps'd per the trademark?). Lisp is often called LISP (check Wikiquote for ample examples), although this is forgivable since Lisp really did used to be an all-caps acronym.

[alayne]

It's stylized as "LOGO" in Papert's 1981 book Mindstorms and in papers written by Papert in the 1970s.

[fractalb]

Logic Oreinted, Graphic Oriented

[simonblack]

Good ol' C, still in the 'most used' group 40 years later. The other four? Not so much today.

[bawolff]

I think the craziest thing is the (far in the distance) runner up is probably prolog, which is also maybe the most unique of the bunch.

[jacquesm]

And they missed assembly, COBOL and BASIC which probably was the other 49% of professional programming. Though they may have had a different context in mind when they wrote this.

[hilsdev]

It was a small shop but I worked for a company that used DSPs running forth. It was my first introduction to meta programming. I learned a lot there

[timbit42]

C has been a disaster for software stability and security. We should have stuck with Ada or Oberon.

[teddyh]

Remarkably honest and unbiased.