4 ms·
Used extensively on Burroughs mainframes.
by dboreham 11mo ago
Used extensively on Burroughs mainframes.
- Taniwha 11mo agoBurroughs used an Algol60 derivative (not '68)
- pjmlp 11mo agoESPOL initially, which evolved into NEWP.
- Taniwha 11mo agoESPOL was (is?) simply a version of the standard Algol compiler that let you do 'system' sorts of things. The Burroughs large systems architecture didn't really protect you from yourself, system security/integrity depended on only letting code from vetted compilers run (only a compiler could make a code file, and only a privileged person could make a program a compiler) - so the Algol 60 compiler made code that was safe, Espol could make code that wasn't, could do things a normal user couldn't - you kept the espol compiler somewhere safe away from the students .... (there was a well known hole in this whole thing involving mag tapes)
- pjmlp 11mo agoAs mentioned it evolved into NEWP, and you can get all the manuals from Unisys, as they keep selling it. Given its architecture, it is sold for batch processing systems where security is paramount. Yes, ESPOL and NEWP, being one of the first systems languages with UNSAFE code blocks, a binary that is compiled having unsafe is tainted and requires administrator configuration before being allowed to execute by the system. One cannot just compile such code and execute it right away.
- somat 11mo agoWow, The Burroughs large system had special instructions explicitly for efficient algol use. You could almost say it was algol hardware. but algol 60 not 68. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burroughs_Large_Systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burroughs_Large_Systems There is a large system emulator that runs in a browser, I did not get any algol written but I did have way to much fun going through the boot sequence. https://www.phkimpel.us/B5500/webUI/B5500Console.html https://www.phkimpel.us/B5500/webUI/B5500Console.html