Algol for VMS?

[Robert]

I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

[Bill Gunshannon]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

I thought I remembered Algol for the VAX, too. However, a quick look
at the 1986 Version of The VAX Software Sourcebook shows nothing at all
related to ALGOL.

bill

[Stephen Hoffman]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find any
references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available and
if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

I've never heard of an ALGOL implementation for VAX/VMS or OpenVMS. Not
from DEC, et al.

Search finds no (old) references to ALGOL here in the comp.os.vms
newsgroup, either.

The ALGOL Wikipedia page lists various implementations, one of which is
S-algol, which might work on an OpenVMS platform with JVM available.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-algol

Targeting one of the OpenVMS freeware archive hosts for ALGOL information...

https://www.google.com/search?q=site:digiater.nl+algol

...finds a few references to PDP-10 emulation, and potentially with ALGOL.

https://www.digiater.nl/openvms/decus/vmslt01a/vu/retromuseum.html
https://www.digiater.nl/openvms/decus/vmslt02b/vu/pdp10emu.html

These with broken links, but maybe you can use filenames from those
broken links as search targets for more info, as ALGOL is your quest.

[John Dallman]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed
available and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ALGOL_68RS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-algol

John

[Mike T.]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

There was at least one ALGOL68 compiler on VAX/VMS.

I first came across it while studying for my degree at London University, and then again several years later while working for an organisation that included RSRE. I don't think they were the same version, the first time would have been around 1985 while the latter was around 1994.

[Mike T.]

Some OLD code
https://mike632t.wordpress.com/2014/03/09/algol68-linked-list/

[Robert]

On Tue, 12 Jan 2021 10:56:48 -0800 (PST), "Mike T."

Post by Mike T.

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

There was at least one ALGOL68 compiler on VAX/VMS.
I first came across it while studying for my degree at London University, and then again several years later while working for an organisation that included RSRE. I don't think they were the same version, the first time would have been around 1985 while the latter was around 1994.

Thank goodness someone else remembers it. I thought my memory had
failed (well it does have some bit rot of course, but perhaps not that
bad).

Shame there doen't seem to be any copies around the www.

[gah4]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

Early VMS had the ability to run RSX-11 software.

Was there an RSC-11 ALGOL that could have been used that way?

[Ian Miller]

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

There was a Algol for VAX/VMS V5.4

See https://mike632t.wordpress.com/tag/algol-68/

[John E. Malmberg]

Post by Ian Miller

Post by Robert
I first learned Algol on a pdp10 and I'm almost certain that I later
used it on a Vax 780 in the early 80's but I've been unable to find
any references to Algol on VMS. Am I wrong or was it indeed available
and if so are there any copies of it available anywhere?

There was a Algol for VAX/VMS V5.4
See https://mike632t.wordpress.com/tag/algol-68/

http://algol68.sourceforge.net/

Have fun.

Regards,
-John
***@qsl.net_work

[[e-mail]]

I've been looking around for the VAX/VMS version of the RSRE Algol68RS compiler which we used to use at the University of Liverpool Department of Computer Science, having moved away from Algol68C on the CTL Mod 1. My enquires at Altran (UK), Oxford University, even back at Liverpool, went nowhere.

The RS compiler was essentially a one-pass compiler for a very large subset of the language. Parallel clauses (and therefore SEMA) weren't implemented. Identifiers had to be declared textually before referenced elsewhere, so procedure variables were necessary for mutually recursive procedures. Mutually recursive modes used the idea of a stub, ie:

MODE A, B = STRUCT(....., A something, ....), A = actual definition of A.

The RS compiler had a really good separate compilation and module composition system which preserved the compilation context so important to the language.

There were 'lower level' modes much closer to machine representation and coercions designed to keep the implementation standard. For example, the mode of "HELLO" was a priori STRUCT5CHAR not [ ]CHAR, with the 5 being part of the mode. This would quite happily be coerced into [ ]CHAR as the context demanded.

External routines could be defined using ALIEN, for example:

PROC(.......)INT sys qiow = ALIEN "SYS$QIOW"

and they obeyed the VMS calling standard along with certain operator-like bold words for changing the parameter passing mechanism, such as VMSIMMED for passing by immediate value rather than the default by reference.

Formatted transput was there and, from what I remember, fully implemented.

We did have access to FLACC on the university's IBM 3083 at the time, but EDT (and EVE) and VMS's DEBUG seemed much nicer than XEDIT and terse 'abend' messages.

Keith