Refal - Programming language

Refal is a programming language created in 1968 by Valentin Turchin.

#1050on PLDB

56Years Old

Refal (Recursive functions algorithmic language) "is functional programming language oriented toward symbol manipulation", including "string processing, translation, [and] artificial intelligence". It is one of the oldest members of this family, first conceived in 1966 as a theoretical tool with the first implementation appearing in 1968. Refal was intended to combine mathematical simplicity with practicality for writing large and sophisticated programs. Read more on Wikipedia...

Tags: programming language
Early development of Refal happened in http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/TURCHIN.html
Explore Refal snippets on Rosetta Code
Refal on HOPL
refal.net was registered in 1999
See also: (2 related languages) Prolog, Lisp

Example from hello-world:

$ENTRY Go { = <Hello>;}
Hello {
   = <Prout 'Hello World'>;
}

Example from the Hello World Collection:

* Hello world in Refal

$ENTRY Go { = <Hello>;}
Hello {
   = <Prout 'Hello world'>;
}

Example from Wikipedia:

Squeeze {
    '__'e.1 = <Squeeze '_'e.1>;
    s.A e.1 = s.A <Squeeze e.1>;
    = ; };

Language features

Feature	Supported	Example	Token
Strings	✓	'Hello world'	'
Print() Debugging	✓
Comments	✓	* A comment
Line Comments	✓	* A comment	*
Semantic Indentation	X