The Origins of APL

In the same theme as my last post, what’s old is often new again…

While I was on vacation, I read Shasha and Lazere’s new book Natural Computing and was surprised to see a small section dedicated to Iverson’s APL, J and K interest.

Below is a brilliant roundtable discussion on APL featuring Ken Iverson and others. I saw it a year ago, but it’s worth watching again if you’ve had any exposure to – or mental damage from – APL/J/K.

Pour yourself some scotch, sit back, and enjoy:

There is additional discussion at LtU.

Also check out Catherine Lathwell’s cleverly named blog Chasing Men Who Stare at Arrays. Catherine is working on a documentary about the history of APL language and its founders.