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Archive-name: computer-lang/pli-faq 
Posting-Frequency: three-monthly (Jan Apr Jul Oct) 
Last-Modified: 28 September 2002 
Version: 1.27 

FREQUENTLY-ASKED QUESTIONS & ANSWERS 

(Q1) What is PL/I? 

     PL/I is a general-purpose programming language, which 
     is used for solving problems in a variety of fields 
     such as commerce, science (including mathematics, 
     physics, chemistry), engineering (including civil, electrical, 
     aeronautics), medicine and so on.  It can be used for 
     system programming, and the facilitites are such that 
     it is rarely if ever necessary to resort to machine-language 
     or assembly-language programming to solve problems. 

     PL/I has outstanding facilities for commercial and business use. 

     It has more power than Pascal, Fortran 95, BASIC, C, and 
     COBOL, and has comparable facilities to Ada. 
     The main areas where PL/I is superior include interrupt 
     handling, the built-in debugging aids, the macro 
     processor facilities, string-handling, and input-output 
     (see below). 
. 
     The language has good documenting and self-documenting 
     facilities;  programs are easy to read and to understand. 
     It bears some resemblance to Fortran and BASIC. 
. 
     The language is suitable for beginners, as well as for 
     anyone wanting to become a professional. 
. 
     There's a summary of what you'll find in PL/I at: 
. 
 http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pliwhat.htm 
. 
    or a slightly truncated version at: 
. 
 http://www-4.ibm.com/software/ad/pli/about.htm 
. 
(Q2) On what systems is it available? 
. 
     PL/I is available on at least the following systems: 
. 
 IBM PC and compatibles (80x86). 
. 
        *  IBM VisualAge PL/I for OS/2: is available in 2 versions: 
  Enterprisel Edition	} 
  Professional Edition	} Details at the bottom of this posting 
  accompanied by the 
  live editor LPEX 
  ---available from IBM 
. 
        *  Liant Open PL/I, for 80x86 & Pentium running UNIX SVR3 and SVR4 
  ---available from Liant Software Corporation, 
     959 Concord Street, 
     Framingham, MA 01701-4613, 
     Tel. (508) 872-8700, Fax (508) 626-2221 
  (their PL/I generally is available on Unix-based systems) 
. 
        * Windows NT -- available from Liant Software Corporation. 
. 
        * Windows NT -- available from IBM as VisualAge PL/I, with the 
  live parsing editor LPEX. 
. 
 * DOS -- the original Digital Research PL/I for DOS.  Available 
  from Discus Distributiuons at: 
  http://www.wolfenet.com/~nalcott/ 
. 
        IBM AS/400 
      --- available from IBM. 
. 
       IBM mainframes 
  --- available from IBM. 
  --- available as IBM VisualAge PL/I under OS/390. 

      HP 9000 HP-UX 
  --- available from Liant Software Corporation 
. 
      SPARC SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x 
  --- available from Liant Software Corporation 
. 
      IBM RS/6000 AIX 
  --- available from Liant Software Corporation (address above); 
  --- also available from IBM as VisualAge PL/I. 
. 
        Data General AViiON with DG-UX 
  --- available from Liant Software Corporation 
. 
        Compaq (formerly Digital Equipment Corporation) on Open VMS and Alpha 
    AXP systems (Tru64 Unix) 
  ---The compilers from Kednos Corporation for these systems are 
     called "PL/I for Open VMS" and "PL/I for Tru64 Unix" 
     respectively.  They took over support for PL/I from UniPrise. 
. 
  Take a look at Kednos' web page: http://www.freja.kednos.com 
  for manuals and compilers. 
  For infomation, contact [email protected] 
. 
       Stratus Computer, Inc. under VOS on all their systems except AX/R-S. 
  --- available from Stratus Computer, Inc. 
. 
       Wang/Getronics systems.  Recent updates make the compiler Y2K compliant. 
  --- available from Wang Laboratories, Billerica, Mass. 
. 
       Fujitsu-Siemens BS2000 system. 
  --- visit them at: 
  http://www.fujitsu-siemens.com/servers/pl1/pl1_us.htm 
  where you can download a specification brochure in PDF format. 
. 
(Q3) How can I try out PL/I? 
. 
        Why not try out the demo copy at: 
. 
        ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/ps/products/pli/demos/ 
. 
        There's also the original Digital Research PL/I for DOS at: 
. 
 http://www.mathcs.emory.edu/~cfs/cpm 
. 
        It's a subset of PL/I, of course, because it had to fit 
        in 64K originally (I think).  There's the original manual too, 
 in MS Word 6 format, but as it's been scanned, it is incomplete. 
 Without an actual manual, I've taken it about as far as I can. 
 The PL/I Reference Manual is in Microsoft Word 6 format, zipped at: 
. 
 http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/ref-w6.zip 
. 
 If that mirror site is down, you could try to link to the main site at: 
. 
 http://cdl.uta.edu/cpm/cpm.html 
. 
 but as there have been problems connecting to it, don't count on it. 
. 
        Find the PCDOS section, and then check out DOWNLOADS. 
. 
        Be sure to download the utilities (including the linker) 
        as well as the compiler and sample codes. 
. 
 You'll also need the compiler flags to use it, at: 
. 
 http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/options.txt 
. 
 It you want the CP/M-86 PL/I compiler, go to the same site 
 as mentioned above, and go to the PCDOS section, check out 
 DOWNLOADS, and the CP/M-86 section. 
. 
 To order the compiler from IBM, go to: 
. 
  http://www.direct.ibm.com/ 
. 
 Select "Software", then select "Application Development". 
. 
(Q4) What do the compilers provide?</H3> 
. 
 All compilers provide enhanced versions of the ANSI standard 
 (the IBM AS/400 adheres to SAA rules, and DR PL/I implements 
 the subset G).  There's a 
 summary of what you'll find in PL/I at: 
. 
 http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pliwhat.htm 
. 
 Example PL/I source code, to implement the new built-in functions 
 (on non-OS/2, non-IBM-Windows and non-AIX systems and non-VisualAge 
 compilers on OS/390 machines) for: 
. 
 The SEARCH built-in function: 
. 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/search.htm 
. 
 The SEARCHR built-in function at: 
. 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/searchr.htm 
. 
 and the VERIFY (3 argument version) and VERIFYR built-in functions at: 
. 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/verify.htm 
. 
 (these are in plain text form). 
. 
 Further PL/I examples of a tutorial nature are at 
. 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/shell.htm 
. 
 (an insertion sort), and a 
. 
 http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/lists.htm 
. 
 (a linked list creation procedure (under construction)). 
. 
 In each case, click on the keywords for an explanation. 
. 
        In the cases of IBM VisualAge PL/I for OS/2, PL/I set for AIX, 
        Windows NT, and OS/390 some important new language features are 
        provided and include: 
. 
 (a) strongly-typed list processing in which the pointers 
     (handles) are bound to the structures with which they 
     are linked; 
 (b) ordinals; 
 (c) user-defined types; 
 (d) Unsigned integer type; 
 (e) New DO loop options that cause the loop to 
     terminate without overrunning the limit (specifically 
     for ordinals and unsigned integers); and 
 (f) A much-enhanced macro-processor. 
 (g) Initial support for wide character set, enabling such files to be 
     read and written.  A number of new built-in functions for 
     wide characters is provided. 
. 
 (this is not an exhaustive list) 
 There are also some 120 new built-in functions, including 
 extra-special DATE/TIME functions, string-handling 
 functions, housekeeping functions (e.g., 
 where-am-I-called-from?), and ordinal functions 
 (including a function to supply the name of an ordinal!). 
. 
(Q5) What textbooks are available? 
. 
 Some of the best include: 
. 
    R.A. Barnes,     PL/I for Programmers, North-Holland, 1979. 
    J.K. Hughes,     PL/I Structured Programming, 3rd Ed., Wiley, 1986. 
    G.F. Groner,     PL/I Programming in Technological Applications, 
       Books on Demand, Ann Arbor, MI, 1971. 
    M.E. Anderson,   PL/I for Programmers, Prentice-Hall, 1973. 
    D.R. Stoutemyer, PL/I Programming for Engineering & Science, 
        Prentice-Hall, 1971. 
    R. Reddy & C. Ziegler, PL/I: Structured Programming and 
                             Problem Solving, West, 1986, ISBN 0-314-93915-6. 
        Check out the Table of Contents: 
    http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/reddy.txt 
    E. Sturm, Das neue PL/I (fur PC, Workstations and Mainframe 
     (in German language), 5th Ed., 
    Vieweg-Verlag (2002) 
    ISBN: 3-528-44792-9. 
  See the table of contents at: 
     http://www.uni-muenster.de/ZIV/Mitarbeiter/EberhardSturm.html 
. 
    R. A. Vowels, http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/PLI-BOOK.HTM 
        Introduction to PL/I, Algorithms, and 
                             Structured Programming, 3rd revised Ed., 1998, ISBN
                             0-9596384-9-0. 600+ pages, A4 size. 
        See a list of the main algorithms at: 
          http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/algor-p.htm 
        Comes with a disc containing all the programs, 
        procedures, and functions from the book.  The 
        disc was first published in October 1996, and 
        was last updated in April 2001. 
. 
 The following are good PL/I reference manuals. (The 
 new facilities of PL/I for OS/2 are highlighted.  Therefore 
 you can use these manuals as references on either mainframe or 
 PC system.) 
. 
 IBM, PL/I for OS/2: Language Reference, 1994 edition 
 IBM, PL/I for OS/2: Built-in Functions, 1994 edition 
 IBM, VisualAge PL/I Language Reference, Version 2.1, 1998 edition. 
. 
(Q6) Is there a newsletter? 
. 
 Yes. 
 The August 2002 issue of "The PL/I Newsletter" may be viewed at: 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli-n5.htm 
 The November 2001 issue of "The PL/I Newsletter" may be viewed at: 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli-n4.htm 
 The June 2001 issue of "The PL/I Newsletter" may be viewed at: 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli-n3.htm 
 The September 2000 issue of "The PL/I Newsletter" may be viewed at: 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli-n2.htm 
 You may download the July 2000 issue from: 
  http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli-n1.doc 
. 
 The COBOL and PL/I Newsletter is at: 
  http://www-4.ibm.com/software/ad/cobol/newslet.htm" 
 This newsletter replaces "The PL/I Connection" newsletter. 
. 
 To see earlier issues of "The PL/I Connection", published by Team PL/I, 
 view 
  http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/news.htm. 
 For specific most-recent issues, go direct: 
  http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/pli1297.htm 
   December 1997 PL/I Connection, 
  http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/pli0497.htm 
   April 1997 PL/I Connection, and 
  http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/pli0996.htm 
   September 1996 PL/I Connection. 
. 
(Q7) Is there a home page? 
. 
 There are at least eight of interest: 
    http://www-4.ibm.com/software/ad/pli 
   IBM's PL/I Home page.  Click on the 
   "about" button for the "What is PL/I" page. 
   Click on the "Library" button for PL/I Reference 
   Manuals for various IBM platforms. 
. 
    http://www-4.ibm.com/software/ad/pli/about.htm 
. 
  What is PL/I ? </A> gives you an overview of PL/I. 
. 
    http://www.liant.com Liant Software Corporation 
. 
  (then click on the LPI button) 
. 
    http://www.dec.com/home.html		Digital 
  (then select OpenVMS ..., or you may find the direct 
   link quicker -> 
. 
    ftp://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/info/SPD/25-30-XX.txt	Digital 
. 
    ftp://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/info/SPD/25-30-21.txt	Digital 

    http://www.uniprise.com	 UniPrise 
. 
    http://www.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/Languages/ 
   Yahoo's Language directory </A> 
   Or if you prefer, you can start on 
   http://www.yahoo.com/ 
   Yahoo's main directory and take 
   it from there.  When the Languages display comes up, go beneath the 
   main list, where you'll find PL/I.  Click on that, and then you can 
   go to different sites. 
. 
    http://www.utu.fi/~sisasa/oasis/oasis-pli.spml 
   The PL/I Oasis lists several interesting sites. 
. 
    http://home.nycap.rr.com/pflass/pli.htm 
   Peter Flass's PL/I home page. 
. 
    http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/why_not.htm 
   Why not use PL/I </A>? 
. 
          Other possible sites are as follows: 
 . 
 Japan:	http://www.ibm.co.jp/pc/prod/sa/0272.html 
. 
 If you know of any other home pages, please advise the author. 
. 
(Q8) Where can I find discussion groups? 
. 
     *  A PL/I newsgroup was established in January 1996 
        following the passing on 3 January 1996 of voting for 
        the newsgroup "comp.lang.pl1" (350 votes for, 18 
        votes against). 
. 
     *	Join [email protected] on the internet. 
    To subscribe, send a note to [email protected] 
    In the body of the note, enter: 
. 
    SUB PL1-L yourname 
. 
    To post a comment, send it to [email protected] 
. 
     *	On Compuserve, enter: go os2df1 
    Then go to subsection 6: "Rexx and other languages". 
. 
 See also http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/pliforum.htm 
. 
     *  Russian: Discussion of PL/I in Russian takes place on 
        relcom.comp.os.os2.prog 
. 
     *  German: Seems to take place at:    de.comp.sys.amiga.misc 
. 
     *  Or consider attending a SHARE PL/I presentation as either a 
        spectator or presenter.  Postings appear from time to 
        time in comp.lang.pl1 
. 
(Q9) How did PL/I originate? 
. 
     PL/I came into being as a result of an attempt to produce 
     a revision of FORTRAN.  Such were the changes necessary that 
     it was not possible to introduce the new features needed 
     to bring FORTRAN up-to-date, and to be compatible with 
     existing prgrams, that it was decided to introduce a 
     new language that incorporated the best features of the 
     then main languages FORTRAN, COBOL, and Algol. 
. 
     Originally, the new language was called "New Programming 
     Language", or NPL.  However, as these initials were 
     already taken by the National Physics Laboratory in 
     Britain, the name became PL/I (for Programming Language One). 
. 
     The new language contained features not then seen before in 
     a general-purpose programming language -- including interrupt 
     handling, array operations, list processing, and a macro 
     pre-processor. 
. 
     There is some controvesy over the name -- whether it is PL/I 
     or PL/1.  The first manuals (for the first compiler, the 
     IBM PL/I (F) compiler) called it PL/I, not PL/1. The ANSI 
     standard calls it PL/I.  The title of the first reference 
     manual is: 
     "IBM System 360 PL/I (F) Language Reference Manual", 1966. 
. 
(Q10) What tools are available? 
. 
     Some are: [this question is under construction] 
. 
     PL/I Analyzer is a reverse engineeering and re-engineering tool, 
     available from 
. 
         http://www.phoenixst.com/pli-analyzer-info-sheet-1-5.html 
. 
     Phoenix Software Technologies, 6701 Democracy Blvd, 
     Suite 300, Bethesda MD 20817, U.S.A.       Tel (301) 571-2431 
     email: [email protected] 
. 
     Version 2.0 is the latest, with Year 2000 diagnosis. 
 Phoenix has also released PLI-2000, a tool for locating 
 Year 2000 problems. 
. 
 Phoenix Software Technologies provides tools and services for Software 
 Maintenance, legacy Software reengineering and the Year 2000 
 (Y2K, Millennium) Problem including PL/I and Natural/Adabas.  
. 
     MicroFocus offers tools to accompany PL/I for OS/2.  For more infomation,
     contact them at Suite 400, 2465 East Bayshore Road, Palo Alto, CA 94303,
     U.S.A. Visit:	http://www.mfltd.co.uk/  
. 
     PLIFORM is a PL/I source code formatter, available from 
     Magicon, Inc.  You'll find them at: 
     1124 Linda Drive, Campbell, California 95008-4507, U.S.A. 
. 
     Peter Osterman's PL/I source code reformatter. 
. 
 The PL/I source code reformatter for Windows (formpli3.exe, 
 414k self extracting file) created by Peter Ostermann of Germany 
 and made available by the IBM Team PL/I members. 
. 
 The PL/I source code reformatter at: 
. 
 http://www.software.ibm.com/ad/pli/tiptools.htm 
. 
 can help make jumbled code more readable by putting statements 
 on separate lines and pointing out the nesting levels by indention. 
. 
 The reformatter is a standalone product, is easy to use, and 
 does the job in a few seconds. It requires just one megabyte 
 of disk space, so give it a try. 
. 
 Send suggestions or comments to: [email protected] 
. 
 Visit:  http://home.nordwest.net/Peter.Ostermann/ 
. 
 for more information and download on Peter's personal web page. 
. 
    This PL/I package from Eberhard Sturm implements the REXX parse macro 
    on the mainframe and the workstation: 
. 
 http://www.uni-muenster.de/ZIV/Mitarbeiter/EberhardSturm/parse.inc 
. 
(Q11) What's happening?  What conferences? 
. 
     Find out <A HREF = "wots-hot.htm"> What's New? 
. 
(Q12) Where can I read about PL/I? 
. 
     The URL http://www.ionet.net/~mclapper/ 
. 
     is a white paper on object-oriented PL/I programming. 
. 
     An interesting article on PL/I appeared in the Enterprise 
     Systems Journal in December 1995.  You can view Lou Marco's 
     "In Praise of PL/I" at: 
. 
     http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/enterp.htm 
. 
     Why not take a look at the paper 
. 
     http://www.uni-muenster.de/ZIV/Mitarbeiter/EberhardSturm/PL1andC.html . 
     Power vs Adventure -- PL/I and C ? 
. 
     Another paper on PL/I and C is Richard Perkinson's "To 'C' or Not to 'C'"
     at http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/perkins.htm 
. 
To order PL/I: 
. 
 You can now order - and receive - IBM's PL/I for Windows online!  Check out the
 Electronic Showcase Delivery page at 
. 
      http://ism.boulder.ibm.com/es/ESDPilot/startme.htm 
. 
 There is also a link to this from the PL/I home page. 
. 
 ESD is currently a pilot program and is available in EMEA countries and 
 the US. 
. 
. 
    You may read this in http://www.users.bigpond.com/robin_v/pli_faq.htm 

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