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Last used APL in 1981; We had keyboards specialized for the APL char set. IMO Its pithy syntax was just not worth it, even back then, so haven't returned since

Last used APL in 1981; We had keyboards specialized for the APL char set. IMO Its pithy syntax was just not worth it, even back then, so haven't returned since and don't see any reason to break my 40 year hiatus.

beagle3 5y ago
APL's greatest contribution is its semantics, not its syntax. (Some parts of the syntax are brilliant and would be awesome if adopted by modern languages. Others ..... not so much).
- throwaway17_17 5y ago
  Which pieces of APL would you see fitting in a modern language? Simply curious about preferences of people who already enjoy the semantics and would find the APL syntax ideal.
  - Wezl 5y ago
    (not parent) personally I would like to see [trains](https://aplwiki.com/wiki/Tacit_programming#Trains https://aplwiki.com/wiki/Tacit_programming#Trains) in more languages, though the way they are implemented in APL is pretty spotty (e.g. the length of a train changes its semantics)
  - beagle3 5y ago
    I think adopting the “each” syntax would help every language that has containers - including Python and C# It is semantically more like “map” than “foreach”, but syntactically emphasized the applied function rather than the fact that it is applied to the container - and that shows especially when nested - f””x or f”[2]x means “apply at depth two”. Compare that to a nested map/foreach There are other syntax features I like, but most of them do interact with semantics (some more, some less). This one is useful in any language.