Computer Science / Unit 7 CS 0354 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Fortran, the First Compiler
Captions available
The idea
Fortran, created at IBM in the early 1950s, was the first high-level language to use a compiler — software converting source code from one language to another — among computing's biggest advances.
In practice
Science ran on it for decades; readable source became runnable machine work.
Where people slip
The compiler, not the syntax, was the revolution.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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