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Comment by dboreham

1 month ago

Used extensively on Burroughs mainframes.

Burroughs used an Algol60 derivative (not '68)

  • ESPOL initially, which evolved into NEWP.

    • ESPOL 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)

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