Open source Algol 68 implementations

About this project

The development of Algol played an important role in establishing computer science as an academic discipline. The SourceForge Algol 68 project preserves and promotes Algol 68 by making available open source Algol 68 implementations and documentation. Currently, two implementations are available from this project:

» Algol 68 Genie (a68g) is a recent checkout hybrid compiler-interpreter, written from scratch by Marcel van der Veer. It ranks among the most complete Algol 68 implementations. It implements for example arbitrary precision arithmetic, complex numbers, parallel processing, partial parametrisation and formatted transput, as well as support for curses, regular expressions and sounds. It can be linked to GNU plotutils, the GNU scientific library and PostgreSQL. Algol 68 Genie is free software released under GNU GPLv3.

» algol68toc is a port by Sian Mountbatten of those parts of vintage ALGOL68RS that were made available as ctrans with DRA Malvern's ELLA package. A notable unpublished part is formatted transput. Since ALGOL68RS was a one-pass compiler, algol68toc puts restrictions on Algol 68. The components of algol68toc have multiple licenses that should be read carefully: it is open source software, but not all components are fully free.

Project team

» Algol 68 Genie author and maintainer: Marcel van der Veer.
» Package builder: Neville Dempsey.

Further information

» Algol 68 code samples at Rosetta Code
» Software Preservation Group
» Dick Grune's website with legacy Algol 68 data
» LinkedIn Algol 68 professional group
» IFIP Working Group 2.1
» Algol 68 on Wikipedia

Online documentation
Learning Algol 68 Genie

Edited by Marcel van der Veer. A detailed description of Algol 68 containing an informal introduction to the language, a manual for Algol 68 Genie, and the Revised Report on Algol 68.

Revised Report on Algol 68

Edited by Marcel van der Veer. Hyperlinked HTML version of this formal report, that ranks among the difficult publications in computer science.
Informal Introduction to Algol 68

Recently, this well-known book by C.H. Lindsey and S.G. van der Meulen [1977], was made available online.
Packages and Links

Copyright © 2018 J.M. van der Veer.
Updated August 2018.