<
language> (Formula Translation) The first and, for a long time, the most widely used programming language for numerical and scientific applications. The original versions lacked
recursive procedures and block structure and had a line-oriented
syntax in which certain columns had special significance.
There have been a great many versions.
The name is often written "FORTRAN", harking back to the days before computers were taught about lower case, but
ANSI decreed, in about 1985 via the ANSI
FORTRAN Technical Committee
TC, that it should be "Fortran".
See also:
Fortrash.
[Was
Fortran I the first version?]