The Howdy Glossary

DG/L (Data General Language) emerged in the late 1960s, developed by Data General Corporation for their Nova line of minicomputers. The language aimed to provide an accessible and efficient programming platform for a broad audience, including both programmers and non-programmers. DG/L distinguished itself with its innovative approach of separating source code into specifications and implementation, enhancing portability across different machines running Data General's operating systems. This separation allowed machine-independent program specifications using system calls rather than low-level assembly instructions.

DG/L stood out in the programming landscape due to several unique features that made it user-friendly and highly functional. The separation of source code into specifications and implementation enabled detailed yet machine-independent programs, simplifying the development process by allowing programmers to focus on high-level logic without being tied to specific hardware details. Support for system calls from a pre-existing library further facilitated portability and streamlined development processes, making DG/L accessible to a wider range of users compared to more specialized languages like Fortran or COBOL.

Despite these competitive advantages, DG/L faced significant competition from established high-level languages such as Fortran, known for its powerful numerical computation capabilities in scientific computing, and COBOL, favored for business data processing with its English-like syntax. These languages had entrenched user bases offering functionalities tailored to specific needs which posed challenges for DG/L’s adoption among programmers on Data General's Nova line of minicomputers. Nonetheless, DG/L's emphasis on ease of learning, use-centric design, and enhanced portability marked it as an innovative step forward in expanding programming accessibility during its time.