LOC is not Fortran. C_LOC is. "pointer arithmetic" is not Fortran. The Fortran POINTER should not be confused with a C pointer (POINTER has more information).

LOC is not Fortran. C_LOC is. "pointer arithmetic" is not Fortran. The Fortran POINTER should not be confused with a C pointer (POINTER has more information). You cannot do arithmetic with a TYPE(C_PTR), either. LDB allows you to solve the 3rd and 5th RHSs only, when B is dimensioned (1000,100): call with NRHS=2, B=B(1,3) and LDB=2000 You can write a type-bound procedure call x = A%solve(b) with today's Fortran. LAPACK calls can be hidden from the casual user. I doubt that a casual user of C++ would enjoy looking at the implementation of its standard library, either. Yes, 29 year-old code written to a 43-year old standard looks old. How is that a Fortran issue? Would it look any newer if it was written in another 40-year old language? The fact that this code is still the mainstay of scientific computation is evidence of the strength of its design and the design of the programming language.