One day while I was wandering the aisles of my local grocery store, a woman beckoned me over to a table and asked if I would like to “try some imported chocolate?” Neatly arrayed on the table were packages of Lindt, Toblerone, and… Ghiradelli? I asked the woman if California had seceded from the Union, as Ghiradelli, despite its Italian name, hails from San Francisco. I suppose that from the vantage point of New Hampshire, California might as well be another country, much as depicted in that famous Saul Steinberg 1976 cover for The New Yorker, “View of the World from 9th Avenue“.
MoreThe long and winding road
The other day, I posted something in comp.lang.fortran in response to a post asking for a new feature in the Intel Fortran compiler. I suggested that the best thing to do was to submit an issue to Intel Premier Support asking for the feature since the more customers who ask for a feature, the easier job the Fortran project manager has in justifying it. This prompted a startled reply from someone who thought that I was the Intel Fortran project manager. “Heck no,” I replied, “I’m not even the most senior engineer on the project!” Well, really, I’m not on the compiler project itself anymore, but I still sit and work with those who are. Yes, I started my Fortran career at DEC in 1978, but there are others on the team who have been at it longer.
MoreNifty Fifty!
2007 will mark the 50th anniversary of the Fortran language, which was first introduced in 1957. The British Computer Society is sponsoring a retrospective on Fortran in January – perhaps there will be a US event as well.
MoreDoctor Fortran in “Don’t Blow Your Stack!”
“Doctor, my stack is overflowing! What does it mean?! Is there a cure?!” The Doctor frequently sees questions like these, and he realizes it’s time for a general article on the subject of stack allocation, as well as the other memory allocation types, static and dynamic.
MoreDoctor Fortran – Something Old, Something New: Taking a new look at FORMAT
Most Fortran programmers of a “certain age” don’t give a lot of thought to the FORMAT statement – it’s been in the language “forever”, and many of us use only the capabilities that were provided by FORTRAN 77, or perhaps even FORTRAN IV. But as the Fortran standard has evolved, formats have too, and the Good Doctor decided it’s time to review what’s new in FORMAT since FORTRAN 77.
MoreDoctor Fortran Gets Explicit!
In our last issue, the Good Doctor covered the topic of optional arguments, noting that an explicit interface was required. Since explicit interfaces seem to be a common point of confusion for those new to Fortran 90, (and some not so new), we’ll cover this subject in more detail.
MoreDoctor Fortran and the Virtues of Omission
As I was walking up the stair I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today. I wish, I wish he'd stay away. Hughes Mearns (1875-1965)More
Don’t Touch Me There – What error 157 (Access Violation) is trying to tell you
One of the more obscure error messages you can get at run time is Access Violation, which the Visual Fortran run-time library reports as error number 157. The documentation says that it is a “system error,” meaning that it is detected by the operating system, but many users think they’re being told that their system itself has a problem. In this article, I’ll explain what an access violation is, what programming mistakes can cause it to occur, and how to resolve them.
MoreDoctor Fortran in “To .EQV. or to .NEQV., that is the question”, or “It’s only LOGICAL”
Most Fortran programmers are familiar with the LOGICAL data type, or at least they think they are…. An object of type LOGICAL has one of only two values, true or false. The language also defines two LOGICAL constant literals .TRUE. and .FALSE., which have the values true and false, respectively. It seems so simple, doesn’t it? Yes… and no.
MoreDoctor Fortran and “The Dog that Did Not Bark”
In past issues of the newsletter, Dr. Fortran has discussed an assortment of things, sometimes obscure, that the Fortran standard says. In this issue, he’s going to take a page from Sherlock Holmes and talk about things that the standard doesn’t say, and how they can bite you as well.
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