Fortran
Fortran (originally FORTRAN, an acronym for Formula Translation) is a general-purpose, compiled imperative programming language that is especially suited to numeric computation and scientific computing. Originally developed by IBM in the 1950s for scientific and engineering applications, Fortran became the first widely used high-level programming language.
Overview
Fortran is designed with a strong emphasis on performance in numerical calculations. It features static typing, automatic memory management for arrays, and extensive support for parallel and vector processing. The language has undergone many revisions: FORTRAN 66, 77, 90, 95, 2003, 2008, and 2018. Modern Fortran supports object-oriented programming, generic programming, and interoperability with C.
History
Fortran was created by a team led by John Backus at IBM in the mid‑1950s. The first compiler was released in 1957 for the IBM 704. It allowed programmers to write formulas in a more natural mathematical notation instead of assembly language, greatly reducing the time needed to develop scientific programs. The language was standardized by the American Standards Association (ASA) in 1966 as FORTRAN 66, followed by FORTRAN 77, which introduced structured programming constructs. The major revision of Fortran 90 added free-form source input, array operations, modules, and recursion. Subsequent standards have continued to modernise the language.
Features
- Array operations – Fortran has powerful built-in array slicing, broadcasting, and whole-array arithmetic, enabling concise and efficient vectorised code.
- DO loops – The canonical loop construct, with optional increment and control variable, widely used in numerical algorithms.
- Procedural and modular programming – Subroutines, functions, and modules (since Fortran 90) allow code organisation and encapsulation.
- Parallel computing – Coarrays and DO CONCURRENT (Fortran 2008/2018) support shared‑memory and distributed‑memory parallelism.
- Interoperability – The ISO_C_BINDING module (Fortran 2003) allows direct interface with C libraries.
Influence
Fortran heavily influenced later languages such as ALGOL, BASIC, and COBOL, particularly in the areas of array handling and mathematical notation. Its legacy lives on in high‑performance computing; many of the fastest supercomputers in the world still run Fortran code for weather simulation, computational fluid dynamics, and finite‑element analysis.