[SIGCIS-Members] Peter Naur papers (ALGOL 60)

[Paul McJones]

The References section of Peter Naur’s paper “The European Side of the Last Phase of the Development of ALGOL 60” in the first HOPL conference [1] includes an item that begins:

ALGOL 60 documents (1959–1960). Unpublished technical memoranda prepared in connection with the ALGOL 60 conference in Paris, 1960, Jan. 11–16. During the conference the available documents were numbered 1 to 30. Here the numbers 31 and 201 to 221 have been used for further related documents.

and continues with a long numbered sequence of items.

[1] R. L. Wexelblat, editor. History of Programming Languages I. ACM, New York, 1981. https://dl.acm.org/doi/book/10.1145/800025


I’ve long wished I could see the actual items. Recently I learned that Naur's son Thorkil donated Naur’s papers to the Niels Bohr Institute and scanned and curated all the ALGOL 60 papers (plus some related ALGOL 58 items) and posted them online at the Dansk Datahistorisk Forenings (Danish Data History Association):

Peter Naur og Algol 60. (Danish: Peter Naur on Algol 60)
https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/Peter_Naur_og_Algol_60

An overview of Algol 60 development, sources, and Peter Naur's involvement.

Peter Naur. Hvorledes Algol 60 blev til (Danish: How Algol 60 was created). Colloquium at the Datalogisk Institut, 10 March 1972.
Transcript. https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/Peter_Naur_Algol_60_DIKU_Kollokvium_1972-03-10
Audio. https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/Bits:30009181

Peter Naur Algol 60 Documents. (Danish)
https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/Peter_Naur_Algol_60_Documents

The papers and notes by Naur and others during his involvement with Algol 60 during 1959 and 1960 (plus a 1970 letter to Donald Knuth serving as a key to many of the documents).

Most of the actual papers are in English.

I’ve also incorporated links to the individual items in the Standards: evolving algorithmic language <https://softwarepreservation.computerhistory.org/ALGOL/standards.html> section of my History of ALGOL  <https://softwarepreservation.computerhistory.org/ALGOL/>web site.


Paul McJones
paul at mcjones.org

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