Help! Unemployed

Bijan Parsia bparsia at email.unc.edu
Mon Aug 13 02:45:34 UTC 2001


--On Sunday, August 12, 2001 10:02 PM -0400 "Andrew C. Greenberg" 
<werdna at mucow.com> wrote:

>
> On Sunday, August 12, 2001, at 09:21 PM, Richard A. O'Keefe wrote:
>
>> It's a bit like Fortran.  Anyone who spells it "FORTRAN" these days
>> almost certainly hasn't bothered keeping up with the modern standards.
>
> I'll own up to ignorance on this.  When did FORTRAN become Fortran?

See: http://www.fortran.com/fortran/FAQ/gene.html#1.1.0

"FORTRAN is generally the preferred spelling for discussions
       of versions of the language prior to the current one ("90").
       Fortran is the spelling chosen by X3J3 and WG5.
       In this document a feeble effort has been made to capitalize
       accordingly (e.g. vast existing software ... FORTRAN vs.
       generic Fortran to mean all versions of the standard,
       and specifically the modern dialect, ISO 1539:1991)."

>  Is
> that a well-settled convention now?

I think so. LISP is now Lisp. Hmm. Was Forth ever FORTH?

>Has BASIC become Basic as well?

I'd say so. There's an interesting bit further down the page in the FAQ:


"       ---------------------------------------
       ~From: walt at fortran.com (Walt Brainerd)
       ---------------------------------------

       There was an effort to "standardize" on spelling of programming
       languages just after F77 became a standard.  The rule: if you say
       the letters, it is all caps (APL); if you pronounce it as a word,
       it is not (Cobol, Fortran, Ada).  See, for example the definitive
       article describing Fortran 77 in the Oct 1978 issue of the Comm.
       of the ACM.  The timing was such that FORTRAN got put on the
       standard itself, though many always after that have referred to
       it as Fortran 77.  Of course, there are those who think it is
       not truly Fortran if not written with all caps."

Cheers,
Bijan "Admiring Google" Parsia.





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