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Barbra Liskov’s CLU language had multiple returns in 1973, ten years before Common Lisp. I was a student of hers back then. I’m pretty sure I saw multiple retu
by todd8 4y ago
Barbra Liskov’s CLU language had multiple returns in 1973, ten years before Common Lisp. I was a student of hers back then.
I’m pretty sure I saw multiple returns used in pseudo-code on a class handout the semester before I started working on CLU. The class was “Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs” that would lead to the writing of SICP.
- lispm 4y agoLooks like POP-2 from 1968 also had multiple return values. Lisp Machine Lisp is claimed to be the first Lisp to have that feature (end 70s), from where Common Lisp got it.
- edflsafoiewq 4y agoYou're right, CLU is actually where Lua took them from. From "The Evolution of Lua" > From CLU we took multiple assignment and multiple returns from function calls. We regarded multiple returns as a simpler alternative to reference parameters used in Pascal and Modula and to in-out parameters used in Ada; we also wanted to avoid explicit pointers (used in C).