Content as Markdown with YAML front matter

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ

content/history/fortran-microsoft-s-second-programming-language.md

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+---
+title: FORTRAN, MICROSOFT'S SECOND PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE
+date: '1977-08-01'
+years:
+- '1977'
+topics:
+- Software
+params:
+  when: AUGUST 1977
+  image: /media/history/images/timeline_0877_fortran.jpg
+  oc_id: 26
+  source:
+    url: https://web.archive.org/web/20221215134357/http://www.old-computers.com/history/detail.asp?n=26
+    date: '2022-12-15'
+---
+
+![](/media/history/images/timeline_0877_fortran.jpg)
+
+FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslation) was first used in 1957. It was a popular programming language designed specifically to solve scientific, mathematical and engineering problems. Its development started in 1954 with **John Backus** and some IBM designers. It was first featured with IBM 704 computers.
+
+For several years, FORTRAN was the only high level language available and the only alternative to machine-level or assembly language programming.
+
+FORTRAN was the first programming language Bill Gates used in his high school years. His school wanted him to write a class scheduling program on a Digital computer. Bill wrote it in FORTRAN, and designed a special version to put him in classes with no other boys and all the girls he thought were cute!
+
+After BASIC interpreter, FORTRAN was the second software sold by the new Microsoft Company. It was partly written by Bill Gates and ran under the CP/M operating system. The high quality of the software and its documentation placed Microsoft among the first serious suppliers in an emergent professional software industry.
+
+![](/media/history/images/timeline_0877_johnbackus.jpg)