smith%eri.DECnet@MGHCCC.HARVARD.EDU.UUCP (01/26/87)
"Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: it might have been." The recent messages about MUMPS triggered some nostalgia in me for FOCAL. This was a language supported by Digital on virtually all of its machines circa 1970-75. It was said to resemble JOSS (for the JOHNNIAC) and to have strong family ties with MUMPS. It was a personal, interactive, numeric language in very much the same product space as early microcomputer BASIC's, but it was there first, and (in my opinion) far superior. It was not until about 1980 that I started to see microcomputer BASIC's that could hold their own against FOCAL. It was implemented in many versions on the PDP-8, -12, -11, -10, and VAX, and probably others. Interesting versions made significant extensions, e.g. for laboratory use (Jim Van Zee's UW-FOCAL on the 12, NYU FOCAL on the 11, etc). The sad part is that IF Digital had been on the ball, I think they could have captured the early micro market around 79-81. They had a chip version of the PDP-8, and they could have claimed pretty convincingly that OS-8 was better than CP/M, FOCAL was better than BASIC, and 12 bits were better than 8. Part of the reason for FOCAL's decline and fall was that apparently Digital didn't feel they had clear legal title and ownership to the product and got scared to market it. There were big contributions--I think code, not just concepts--from [insert name here, Richard *****] who was also involved in MUMPS. ------