On 8/12/2010 5:34 PM, Jim Lux wrote:
John Smith wrote:
snip

FORTRAN is pretty much a dead language, although you will find strong
argument to that statement in some math circles. While I do agree that
language makes little difference to software engineers, most being
fluent in many/multiple languages, a C translation just keeps the
code, more, up-to-date.


FORTRAN is far from dead in applications processing massive arrays (just
about any finite element program). For instance, I'd venture that most
weather prediction codes are in FORTRAN (MM5, which is a widely used
mesoscale modeling code, is in FORTRAN, as is WRF), as are a lot of
structural analysis (e.g. NASTRAN is in FORTRAN), and virtually ALL
electromagnetics codes.

FORTRAN is hard to beat when it comes to specifying array operations,
and such. Running gridded models doesn't require much in the way of
pointers or string manipulation, which are admittedly a pain in older
FORTRANs (pre FORTRAN-90 or FORTRAN-77). FORTRAN also has an intrinsic
Complex type which is nice.

Compilers for numerical analysis applications (e.g. those weather grid
models) for FORTRAN are highly optimized, too. There's also nifty tools
like FLIC (FORTRAN Loop and Index Converter)


There's even new versions of FORTRAN coming out.


My daughter just got her doctorate from Columbia University. Her thesis
was all about data sets massaged with FORTRAN.

It ain't dead. Far from it.

tom
K0TAR