7 ms·

Plankalkül

56 points by vmorgulis 11y ago

krylon 11y ago
Syntax and historical merit aside, I think this is one of the coolest names for a programming language ever. Technical/mathematical German has - to me as a native German speaker, at least - a sound to it that is somehow ... neither cool nor uncool, actually, it somehow transcends the entire concept.
- MichaelMoser123 11y ago
  Kalkül is the word for calculus used by Leibniz. So that Plankalkül is a calculus for plans. the code example for finding a maximum of three numbers is a bit complex. I mean you can do shorter in assembly
  - YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
    I took it to mean "a calculus for planning" in the GOFAI sense of "planning".
    - krylon 11y ago
      I don't think Zuse had AI in mind at the time. The planning would have to be done by the programmer. This also fits in better with the fact he invented (or at least envisioned) a "Planfertigungsgerät" (plan preparation device) to convert the "Plan" from human-readable notation into something the computer could run (effectively, a compiler).
  - _0ffh 11y ago
    I've always supposed it's a plan for calculus. It seems to me to make more sense that way round.
felixx 11y ago
Slightly related is a kick-scooter that goes by the same name. Made by the hacker MechBern who is also part of the Bodenstaendig 2000 band. Together they produced a great song and promotion video for the Plankalkül scooter called Extreme Einkaufing: http://www.bodenstaendig.de/plankalkul/video-en.html http://www.bodenstaendig.de/plankalkul/video-en.html http://www.bodenstandig.de/media/extreme%20einkaufing%20352x288%20wmv8%20950%20wma8%2064.wmv http://www.bodenstandig.de/media/extreme%20einkaufing%20352x...
brudgers 11y ago
There's part of me half expecting some HN'er to pop up and tell stories about cutting their teeth on a Plankalkül code base as a young whipper-snapper.
- sswaner 11y ago
  Followed by a link to a Plankalkül web framework on GitHub.
  - usrusr 11y ago
    ...and an incomplete js transpiler (), and a heated discussion about how exactly the TIOBE index is unfairly skewed against plankalkül. ( implemented by comparing the provided source against any plankalkül implementations that might exist on http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/ http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/ and emits the highest rated js implementation if it matches, undefined otherwise)
detaro 11y ago
The wikipedia page sadly doesn't show the original, 2D structured notation: http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/figure3.png http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/figure3.png (found with other info onhttp://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/ http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/)
- krylon 11y ago
  I had wondered what that would look like. It is even more confusing than I had imagined.
mafribe 11y ago
Here is a paper that describe the Plankalkül in more detail. * R. Rojas, C. Göktekin, G. Friedland, M. Krüger, Plankalkül: The First High-Level Programming Language and its Implementation. ftp://ftp.mi.fu-berlin.de/pub/reports/TR-B-00-03.pdf
chris_wot 11y ago
The Second World War stopped a lot of good things. One of them was Konrad Zuse.
kafkaesq 11y ago
Ah, German. Such a beautiful language.

56 points by vmorgulis 11y ago

Syntax and historical merit aside, I think this is one of the coolest names for a programming language ever. Technical/mathematical German has - to me as a native German speaker, at least - a sound to it that is somehow ... neither cool nor uncool, actually, it somehow transcends the entire concept.

MichaelMoser123 11y ago
Kalkül is the word for calculus used by Leibniz. So that Plankalkül is a calculus for plans. the code example for finding a maximum of three numbers is a bit complex. I mean you can do shorter in assembly
- YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
  I took it to mean "a calculus for planning" in the GOFAI sense of "planning".
  - krylon 11y ago
    I don't think Zuse had AI in mind at the time. The planning would have to be done by the programmer. This also fits in better with the fact he invented (or at least envisioned) a "Planfertigungsgerät" (plan preparation device) to convert the "Plan" from human-readable notation into something the computer could run (effectively, a compiler).
- _0ffh 11y ago
  I've always supposed it's a plan for calculus. It seems to me to make more sense that way round.

felixx 11y ago

Slightly related is a kick-scooter that goes by the same name. Made by the hacker MechBern who is also part of the Bodenstaendig 2000 band. Together they produced a great song and promotion video for the Plankalkül scooter called Extreme Einkaufing: http://www.bodenstaendig.de/plankalkul/video-en.html http://www.bodenstaendig.de/plankalkul/video-en.html http://www.bodenstandig.de/media/extreme%20einkaufing%20352x288%20wmv8%20950%20wma8%2064.wmv http://www.bodenstandig.de/media/extreme%20einkaufing%20352x...

brudgers 11y ago

There's part of me half expecting some HN'er to pop up and tell stories about cutting their teeth on a Plankalkül code base as a young whipper-snapper.

sswaner 11y ago
Followed by a link to a Plankalkül web framework on GitHub.
- usrusr 11y ago
  ...and an incomplete js transpiler (), and a heated discussion about how exactly the TIOBE index is unfairly skewed against plankalkül. ( implemented by comparing the provided source against any plankalkül implementations that might exist on http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/ http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/ and emits the highest rated js implementation if it matches, undefined otherwise)

detaro 11y ago

The wikipedia page sadly doesn't show the original, 2D structured notation: http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/figure3.png http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/figure3.png (found with other info onhttp://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/ http://www.catb.org/retro/plankalkuel/)

krylon 11y ago
I had wondered what that would look like. It is even more confusing than I had imagined.

mafribe 11y ago

Here is a paper that describe the Plankalkül in more detail. * R. Rojas, C. Göktekin, G. Friedland, M. Krüger, Plankalkül: The First High-Level Programming Language and its Implementation. ftp://ftp.mi.fu-berlin.de/pub/reports/TR-B-00-03.pdf

chris_wot 11y ago

The Second World War stopped a lot of good things. One of them was Konrad Zuse.

kafkaesq 11y ago

Ah, German. Such a beautiful language.