J-100(ID:7242/)

Compiler for JOHNNIAC
Hardware:
References:
  • Ware, Willis H. "JOHNNIAC Eulogy" RAND July 1979 Corp. document P-3313, March 1966, pp. 1l-12 view details Extract: Notable uses of JOHNNIAC
    In the earliest days of 1954, most programming was done in machine language and in absolute octal at that. In 1955 Jules Schwartz wrote the first assembly routine for JOHNNIAC and Cliff Shaw produced a revised assembler in 1956. Then came QUAD, an interpretive programming system, and SMAC, a small compiler. Each was noted for being foolproof. The non-professional programmer could use these systems comfortably; his errors would be reported to him in great detail by the machine. There were other significant contributions to the programming art as well; among them were items with such names as EASY-FOX, CLEM, JBL-4, J-100, MORTRAN done by Mort Bernstein, and Load-and-Go.

    In the late fifties, the nature of JOHNNIAC's task changed. The rental equipment from IBM carried most of the computing load from the RAND staff. JOHNNIAC became a free good; its time was available for research use. The cost of operation was sufficiently low that one need not be concerned about using large amounts of machine time. Much of its time was consumed by research on the general questions of artificial intelligence and the initials NSS came to be closely associated with JOHNNIAC. These are the initials of Allen Newell, Cliff Shaw, and Herb Simon who used the machine extensively for research. During this period came such achievements as:
  • List structures,
  • list processing techniques and their embodiment in such languages as IPL-2, -3, -4;
  • Chess playing routines such as CP-I AND -2;
  • Theorem proving routines such as LT -- the Logic Theorist;
  • The general problem solver GPS;
  • The assembly line balancer of Fred Tonge.
  • Gruenberger, F. J. "The History of the JOHNNIAC" pp57-59 (reprint of Gruenberger 1968) view details
          in Annals of the History of Computing, July 1979 view details