[Freeciv-Dev] Re: OT: Hello World (was: Re: Re: [PATCH] spelling fixes (PR#1526))

[Miguel Farah <miguel@xxxxx>]

 Thanasis Kinias [03/06/2002 18:42] dijo/said:
>scripsit Miguel Farah:
>> You *are* aware that the Hello World program is older than Unix, aren't
>> you?
>
>OK, Miguel, I'll bite.
>
>The oldest reference I can find for "Hello, World" is K&R.  It seems
>like an obvious thing to do, but is there any evidence of its being used
>as the canonical test program before C?


I'll quote from the Jargon File:

   :BCPL: // n.  [abbreviation, `Basic Combined Programming
Language') A programming language developed by Martin Richards in
Cambridge in 1967. It is remarkable for its rich syntax, small size
of compiler (it can be run in 16k) and extreme portability. It reached
break-even point at a very early stage, and was the language in which
the original {hello world} program was written. It has been ported to so
many different systems that its creator confesses to having lost count. It
has only one data type (a machine word) which can be used as an integer,
a character, a floating point number, a pointer, or almost anything else,
depending on context.  BCPL was a precursor of C, which inherited some
of its features.