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The Princeton INTERCAL Compiler's source code


with great excitement that we share the original INTERCAL-72 compiler source code, as both scans and transcriptions (see below). INTERCAL was created by Don Woods (previously interviewed here) and Jim Lyon as undergrads at Princeton in an infamous late-night session after freshman finals in 1972.

INTERCAL was created by Don Woods ( previously interviewed here) and Jim Lyon as undergrads at Princeton in an infamous late-night session after freshman finals in 1972. While previous languages had odd designs as pl research and experimentation, INTERCAL intentionally subverts its programmers' effort to write what Dijkstra called "good code": that which "shortens the conceptual gap between the static program and the dynamic process." Woods and Lyon described it as eschewing conventions of languages like ALGOL, SNOBOL, FOCAL, and AP/I, yet it is also clearly parody, embracing and exaggerating their worst eccentricities and inefficiencies for an alienating experience.

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