Klerer–May System

{{short description|Programming language oriented to numerical scientific programming}}

The Klerer–May System is a programming language developed in the mid-1960s, oriented to numerical scientific programming, whose most notable feature is its two-dimensional syntax based on traditional mathematical notation.

File:Example of a statement in the Klerer-May programming system.png

For input and output, the Klerer–May system used a Friden Flexowriter modified to allow half-line motions for subscripts and superscripts.{{cite journal | title=A user oriented programming language |author1=Klerer, Melvin |author2=May, Jack | journal=The Computer Journal | year=1965 | volume=8 | issue=2 | pages=103–109 | doi=10.1093/comjnl/8.2.103| doi-access=free }} The character set included digits, upper-case letters, subsets of 14 lower-case Latin letters and 18 Greek letters, arithmetic operators (+ − × / |) and punctuation (. , ( )), and eight special line-drawing characters (resembling ╲ ╱ ⎜ _ ⎨ ⎬ ˘ ⁔) used to construct multi-line brackets and symbols for summation, products, roots, and for multi-line division or fractions.{{cite book | title=Programming Languages: History and Fundamentals | publisher=Prentice-Hall | author=Sammet, Jean | year=1969 | pages=284–294 | isbn=0-13-729988-5}}

The system was intended to be forgiving of input mistakes, and easy to learn; its reference manual was only two pages.{{cite book | title=Reference Manual | publisher=Columbia University |author1=Klerer, Melvin |author2=May, Jack | year=1965 | location=Hudson Labs, Dobbs Ferry, NY}}

The system was developed by Melvin Klerer and Jack May at Columbia University's Hudson Laboratories in Dobbs Ferry, New York, for the Office of Naval Research, and ran on GE-200 series computers.