The very first optimizing compiler was written in Fortran, to compile Fortran. I think this was the 60s. The use of pointers in a language vastly complicates t

The very first optimizing compiler was written in Fortran, to compile Fortran. I think this was the 60s. The use of pointers in a language vastly complicates the task of optimization. From Fran Allen, a compiler researcher and co-inventor of SSA, By 1960, we had a long list of amazing languages: Lisp, APL, Fortran, COBOL, Algol 60. These are higher-level than C. We have seriously regressed, since C developed. C has destroyed our ability to advance the state of the art in automatic optimization, automatic parallelization, automatic mapping of a high-level language to the machine. This is one of the reasons compilers are basically not taught much anymore in the colleges and universities.