Talk:COWSEL
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stropping[edit]
"Reserved words (keywords) were also underlined in the original printouts. Popplestone performed syntax highlighting by using underscoring on a Friden Flexowriter." - what you're referring to here is neither reserved words nor syntax highlighting. It's called 'stropping'. (If they were reserved words they would not be usable as variable names within the language, and syntax highlighting is a decoration of a source for output, not a requirement of the input.) This is the variant of stropping as was used in Atlas Autocode, with which the authors (Robin Popplestone and Rod Burstall) were well familiar, since at the time COWSEL was being created, Edinburgh was in the process of adopting Atlas Autocode as their primary programming language, later to be renamed Imp. 70.124.38.160 (talk) 20:09, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
Multipop[edit]
I notice that Wikipedia doesn't have an article on Multipop ( https://www-robotics.cs.umass.edu/Popplestone/OS.html ) - this was a very early multi-user system which (this is from memory, I don't have a reference at the moment, but I'm sure Rod Burstall or Pat Ambler would remember more detils) was a later derivation of what Robin started with COWSEL. Actually, Multipop deserves its own page regardless of whether there's a direct link with COWSEL or not) 70.124.38.160 (talk) 20:26, 31 March 2024 (UTC)