Pascal Tutorials on the Web

Pascal is a high level programming language that was developed in the 1970s by Swiss computer scientist Niklaus Wirth. The language was named in honor of the French mathematician Blaise Pascal, and it was initially popular among academics, owing to its structured form of programming. Pascal is based on the programming language Algol, and it has contributed to the development of later programming languages like dBase, PAL, Delphi, and Ada. Interestingly, most of the original Mac OS and the Tex were written in Pascal.

Pascal is offered in two forms, which are the interpreter and the compiler. A compiler, or ‘Porting Kit’, was created soon after the release of the language, with the intention of promoting the language. The compiler was developed in Zurich, and it contained a compiler for an intermediate code and an associated simulator. It was primarily used for the CDC 6000 computers. The purpose was to enable genuine machine code compilers, and it came to be known as the P-system. Subsequently, the interpretive UCSD P-System was created based on this system.

In the following years, the affordable Borland compiler was developed, and it was well-received by the Pascal community of that time. Programmers found the compiler very suitable for the IBM PCs of the 1980s. IBM also launched the 3650 and 3660 Store Systems during this time, which were essentially pos systems. A growing list of PC users started replacing BASIC programming language with the Borland compiler. The Borland Pascal was succeeded by the Turbo Pascal, which was a concise version of Borland but comparatively lower-priced. Turbo Pascal found its use in the Intel 8088 machine code, making it a much faster consequence. Since then, several compilers have been developed. Some of the most popular ones include the P4 compiler, Free Pascal, Chrome, GNU Pascal Compiler (GPC), Delphi, and Virtual Pascal.

Pascal and the language C were developed around the same time, and they share some similarities. Both of them are small procedural languages, and they facilitate dynamic allocation of memory. There are many differentiators that make Pascal unique as a programming language. Firstly, Pascal was designed as a teaching language, and therefore, its syntax is much easier to understand. This made Pascal one of the most popular programming languages for computer students in the 1980s. Secondly, Pascal facilitates passing parameters by either value or reference, unlike C in which only values can pass parameters. Moreover, it is possible to detect bugs very early in Pascal because it provides sub-range types. Pascal allows nested function definitions as well.

However, Pascal had a few drawbacks which prevented it from being as popular as C in the coming years. Some of the nagging issues with the earlier versions were its problems with string handling, the absence of static variables, non-existence of a separate compilation, defects in the I/O and the ‘Case’ statement, its inability to assemble large programs properly, and the lack of extension mechanism.

Pascal Tutorials on the Web :

  • Learnprogramming.za – Pascal : Pascal tutorial lessons
  • Chilanti – Pascal Language Tutorial : Free online Pascal tutorial e-books
  • Taoyue.com – Learn Pascal : Comprehensive Pascal tutorial with programming assignments
  • PTutor – Pascal Language Tutorial : Pascal tutorial covering sixteen chapters
  • Thinkquest – Pascal : A tutorial on Turbo Pascal
  • Coronado Enterprises – Pascal Tutorial : Pascal tutorial containing 97 source files
  • Techiwarehouse – Pascal : Tutorials on standard Pascal functions
  • Freecountry.com – Pascal Tutorials : Links to free online Pascal tutorials
  • PDF Search Engine – Pascal Tutorial : Downloadable PDF Pascal tutorial
  • Synchrondat a – Pascal Tutorials : Information about Pascal programming tutorials, Pascal mathematics programming files , and others

Even though the new versions of Pascal have rectified most of its limitations, the notion that Pascal is not for ‘serious’ programmers still prevails. Clearing this misconception is the biggest challenge that Pascal has to overcome today.