The Associative Programming Language (APL) is a database language developed by General Motors Research Laboratories in 1966. [1]
APL was developed to provide high-level language data access and manipulation functions to support GM's CADANCE interactive computer graphics system. It was designed to integrate with PL/I. [2] [3]
The underlying database is assumed to follow the network model. GM's first database manager was implemented via linked lists, but in 1977 the "Virtual Associative Access Manager" {VAAM) was developed to use virtual storage and implementing entity relationships as arrays. [1] : p.86 APL was later ported to the MCTS operating system.
APL consists of six statements, CREATE
, INSERT
, FIND
, FOR EACH
, REMOVE
, and DELETE
, [1] : p.85 and miscellaneous functions such as counting the number of members in a set, determining the length or type of an entity, or locating an entity by name. [1] : p.95
ELSE
clause is executed if no entities are found.APL statements were implemented as PL/I preprocessor macros, which translated into calls to the database manager. Later GM's Apple PL/I dialect supported APL directly in the language.
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: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of July 2025 (link)