GSP(ID:3080/gsp001)General Simulation Programfor General Simulation Program K. D. Tocher, United Steel Companies Limited, 1959 Tocher and Owen BISRA 1959 co-development with MONTECODE of generalised simulation system for the Pegasus, not used much outside the steel industry "The first packaged simulator: the General Simulation Program (GSP) of Tocher and Owen (1960)" Hardware:
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References: in Proc. Second Internat. Conf. Oper. Res. , Aix-en-Provence (J. BANBURY and J. MAITLAND Eds), pp. 58-60. English Universities Press 1960 view details in ACM Computing Reviews 3(01) January-February 1962 view details in ACM Computing Reviews 3(01) January-February 1962 view details [321 programming languages with indication of the computer manufacturers, on whose machinery the appropriate languages are used to know. Register of the 74 computer companies; Sequence of the programming languages after the number of manufacturing firms, on whose plants the language is implemented; Sequence of the manufacturing firms after the number of used programming languages.] in ACM Computing Reviews 3(01) January-February 1962 view details in ACM Computing Reviews 15(04) April 1974 view details The exact number of all the programming languages still in use, and those which are no longer used, is unknown. Zemanek calls the abundance of programming languages and their many dialects a "language Babel". When a new programming language is developed, only its name is known at first and it takes a while before publications about it appear. For some languages, the only relevant literature stays inside the individual companies; some are reported on in papers and magazines; and only a few, such as ALGOL, BASIC, COBOL, FORTRAN, and PL/1, become known to a wider public through various text- and handbooks. The situation surrounding the application of these languages in many computer centers is a similar one. There are differing opinions on the concept "programming languages". What is called a programming language by some may be termed a program, a processor, or a generator by others. Since there are no sharp borderlines in the field of programming languages, works were considered here which deal with machine languages, assemblers, autocoders, syntax and compilers, processors and generators, as well as with general higher programming languages. The bibliography contains some 2,700 titles of books, magazines and essays for around 300 programming languages. However, as shown by the "Overview of Existing Programming Languages", there are more than 300 such languages. The "Overview" lists a total of 676 programming languages, but this is certainly incomplete. One author ' has already announced the "next 700 programming languages"; it is to be hoped the many users may be spared such a great variety for reasons of compatibility. The graphic representations (illustrations 1 & 2) show the development and proportion of the most widely-used programming languages, as measured by the number of publications listed here and by the number of computer manufacturers and software firms who have implemented the language in question. The illustrations show FORTRAN to be in the lead at the present time. PL/1 is advancing rapidly, although PL/1 compilers are not yet seen very often outside of IBM. Some experts believe PL/1 will replace even the widely-used languages such as FORTRAN, COBOL, and ALGOL.4) If this does occur, it will surely take some time - as shown by the chronological diagram (illustration 2) . It would be desirable from the user's point of view to reduce this language confusion down to the most advantageous languages. Those languages still maintained should incorporate the special facets and advantages of the otherwise superfluous languages. Obviously such demands are not in the interests of computer production firms, especially when one considers that a FORTRAN program can be executed on nearly all third-generation computers. The titles in this bibliography are organized alphabetically according to programming language, and within a language chronologically and again alphabetically within a given year. Preceding the first programming language in the alphabet, literature is listed on several languages, as are general papers on programming languages and on the theory of formal languages (AAA). As far as possible, the most of titles are based on autopsy. However, the bibliographical description of sone titles will not satisfy bibliography-documentation demands, since they are based on inaccurate information in various sources. Translation titles whose original titles could not be found through bibliographical research were not included. ' In view of the fact that nany libraries do not have the quoted papers, all magazine essays should have been listed with the volume, the year, issue number and the complete number of pages (e.g. pp. 721-783), so that interlibrary loans could take place with fast reader service. Unfortunately, these data were not always found. It is hoped that this bibliography will help the electronic data processing expert, and those who wish to select the appropriate programming language from the many available, to find a way through the language Babel. We wish to offer special thanks to Mr. Klaus G. Saur and the staff of Verlag Dokumentation for their publishing work. Graz / Austria, May, 1973 in ACM Computing Reviews 15(04) April 1974 view details BISRA were the pioneers of digital computing in the steel industry, taking delivery of a Ferranti Pegasus in 1956. Since many problems in the steel industry were amenable to examination by simulation, BISRA developed Montecode, based on Pegasus Autocode, for the purpose. Montecode enabled simulation models to be easily developed, though running times could be long. Collcutt described several early applications of Montecode. United Steel received their Pegasus in February 1958 and quickly concluded that the use of machine code and Pegasus Autocode for simulation were too cumbersome. They decided to develop a general simulation language (GSL) for Pegasus. Progress was described by Tocher and Owen in a paper to the second IFORS Conference in 1960. Experience indicated that a substantial saving of time in writing and testing computer simulations was achieved with GSL on a modified Pegasus, with no severe loss of running speed compared to Pegasus Autocode. It was also flexible enough to deal with a wide range of problems. The use of GSL and Montecode did not spread much beyond the steel industry as they were machine-dependent, though some of their designers assisted in the development of machine-independent simulation languages such as CSL. By 1960 IBM's dominance of large computers was beginning, and FORTRAN was becoming established as a standard scientific programming language. (ALGOL 60, a powerful and versatile machine-independent language, never really got off the ground except in academic circles, partly because IBM refused to accept it.) The use of FORTRAN for simulation was described by Barnett," also at the second IFORS Conference. He used an IBM 704 with various 'adjuncts', including a cathode-ray screen (to show graphs, contour plots etc.), switches and a flexiwriter to key in data and decisions. Perhaps this was the first use of visual interactive simulation. Barnett made the point, which is sometimes forgotten, that developing a logical understanding of the process is more time-consuming than the coding! In 1965 Collcutt confirmed the trend towards the use of Fortran (and languages based on Fortran such as CSL) for carrying out machine-independent simulations. He commented that for simple problems Montecode proved adequate, but for complex problems an even higher-level modular language was needed. One further pioneering development at United Steel was the simulation of information flows and the use of operational gaming so as to improve the real-time control of (stochastic) steel-making plant. Initially management games, involving real managers, were designed so as to validate the simulations, but the potential for improving control and evaluating information quality was soon realized! Amiry and Mellor and Tocher describe a simulation model of a plant which has a model of the information system superimposed upon it, incorporating information lags sampled from distributions. A production game was then played, where the actual management controlled the model of the plant using information displayed on a mimic display board of events and forecasts of events. The speed of information transmission could be successively increased, and the achieved improvements in control evaluated to determine an economic balance, i.e. how much improvement in information quality is worth paying for and how it is best used. in ACM Computing Reviews 15(04) April 1974 view details in ACM Computing Reviews 15(04) April 1974 view details |