4 definitions found
From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]:
pascal
n 1: a unit of pressure equal to one newton per square meter
[syn: {Pa}]
2: French mathematician and philosopher; invented an adding
machine; contributed (with Fermat) to the theory of
probability (1623-1662) [syn: {Pascal}, {Blaise Pascal}]
3: a programing language designed to teach programming through
a top-down modular approach [syn: {Pascal}]
From Jargon File (4.2.3, 23 NOV 2000) [jargon]:
Pascal n. An Algol-descended language designed by Niklaus
Wirth on the CDC 6600 around 1967-68 as an instructional tool for
elementary programming. This language, designed primarily to keep
students from shooting themselves in the foot and thus extremely
restrictive from a general-purpose-programming point of view, was later
promoted as a general-purpose tool and in fact became the ancestor
of a large family of languages including Modula-2 and {{Ada}} (see also
{bondage-and-discipline language}). The hackish point of view on Pascal
was probably best summed up by a devastating (and, in its deadpan way
screamingly funny) 1981 paper by Brian Kernighan (of {K&R} fame) entitled
"Why Pascal is Not My Favorite Programming Language", which was turned
down by the technical journals but circulated widely via photocopies.
It was eventually published in "Comparing and Assessing Programming
Languages", edited by Alan Feuer and Narain Gehani (Prentice-Hall, 1984).
Part of his discussion is worth repeating here because its criticisms
are still apposite to Pascal itself after ten years of improvement and
could also stand as an indictment of many other bondage-and-discipline
languages. At the end of a summary of the case against Pascal,
Kernighan wrote:
9. There is no escape
This last point is perhaps the most important. The language is
inadequate but circumscribed, because there is no way to escape
its limitations. There are no casts to disable the type-checking
when necessary. There is no way to replace the defective run-time
environment with a sensible one unless one controls the compiler
that defines the "standard procedures". The language is closed.
People who use Pascal for serious programming fall into a fatal trap.
Because the language is impotent, it must be extended. But each
group extends Pascal in its own direction, to make it look like
whatever language they really want Extensions for separate
compilation, FORTRAN-like COMMON, string data types, internal
static variables, initialization, octal numbers, bit operators,
etc., all add to the utility of the language for one group but
destroy its portability to others
I feel that it is a mistake to use Pascal for anything much beyond
its original target. In its pure form Pascal is a toy language,
suitable for teaching but not for real programming.
Pascal has since been almost entirely displaced (by {C}) from the
niches it had acquired in serious applications and systems programming,
but retains some popularity as a hobbyist language in the MS-DOS and
Macintosh worlds.
From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (13 Mar 01) [foldoc]:
Pascal
(After the French mathematician {Blaise Pascal}
(1623-1662)) A programming language designed by {Niklaus
Wirth} around 1970. Pascal was designed for simplicity and
for teaching programming, in reaction to the complexity of
{ALGOL 68}. It emphasises {structured programming}
constructs, data structures and {strong typing}. Innovations
included {enumeration type}s, {subrange}s, sets, {variant
record}s and the {case statement}. Pascal has been extremely
influential in programming language design and has a great
number of variants and descendants.
ANSI/IEEE770X3.97-1993 is very similar to {ISO Pascal} but
does not include {conformant array}s.
ISO 7185-1983(E). Level 0 and Level 1. Changes from Jensen &
Wirth's Pascal include name equivalence; names must be bound
before they are used loop index must be local to the
procedure; formal procedure parameters must include their
arguments; {conformant array schema}s.
An ALGOL-descended language designed by Niklaus Wirth on the
CDC 6600 around 1967--68 as an instructional tool for
elementary programming. This language, designed primarily to
keep students from shooting themselves in the foot and thus
extremely restrictive from a general-purpose-programming point
of view, was later promoted as a general-purpose tool and in
fact became the ancestor of a large family of languages
including Modula-2 and {Ada} (see also {bondage-and-discipline
language}). The hackish point of view on Pascal was probably
best summed up by a devastating (and, in its deadpan way
screamingly funny) 1981 paper by Brian Kernighan (of {K&R}
fame) entitled "Why Pascal is Not My Favourite Programming
Language", which was turned down by the technical journals but
circulated widely via photocopies. It was eventually
published in "Comparing and Assessing Programming Languages",
edited by Alan Feuer and Narain Gehani (Prentice-Hall, 1984).
Part of his discussion is worth repeating here because its
criticisms are still apposite to Pascal itself after ten years
of improvement and could also stand as an indictment of many
other bondage-and-discipline languages. At the end of a
summary of the case against Pascal, Kernighan wrote:
9. There is no escape
This last point is perhaps the most important. The language
is inadequate but circumscribed, because there is no way to
escape its limitations. There are no casts to disable the
type-checking when necessary. There is no way to replace the
defective run-time environment with a sensible one unless one
controls the compiler that defines the "standard procedures".
The language is closed.
People who use Pascal for serious programming fall into a
fatal trap. Because the language is impotent, it must be
extended. But each group extends Pascal in its own direction,
to make it look like whatever language they really want
Extensions for separate compilation, Fortran-like COMMON,
string data types, internal static variables, initialisation,
{octal} numbers, bit operators, etc., all add to the utility
of the language for one group but destroy its portability to
others
I feel that it is a mistake to use Pascal for anything much
beyond its original target. In its pure form Pascal is a toy
language, suitable for teaching but not for real programming.
Pascal has since been almost entirely displaced (by {C}) from
the niches it had acquired in serious applications and systems
programming, but retains some popularity as a hobbyist
language in the {MS-DOS} and {Macintosh} worlds.
See also {Kamin's interpreters}, {p2c}.
["The Programming Language Pascal", N. Wirth, Acta Informatica
1:35-63, 1971].
["PASCAL User Manual and Report", K. Jensen & N. Wirth,
Springer 1975] made significant revisions to the language.
[BS 6192, "Specification for Computer Programming Language
Pascal", {British Standards Institute} 1982].
[{Jargon File}]
(1996-06-12)
From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (13 Mar 01) [foldoc]:
Pascal-
Pascal subset used in Brinch Hansen on Pascal Compilers, P.
Brinch Hansen, P-H 1985.
[{Jargon File}]
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