BLISS: a language for systems programming

  • Authors:
  • W. A. Wulf;D. B. Russell;A. N. Habermann

  • Affiliations:
  • Carnegie-Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA;SRC Atlas Laboratory, Berks, England;Carnegie-Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA

  • Venue:
  • Communications of the ACM
  • Year:
  • 1971

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Abstract

A language, BLISS, is described. This language is designed so as to be especially suitable for use in writing production software systems for a specific machine (the PDP-10): compilers, operating systems, etc. Prime design goals of the design are the ability to produce highly efficient object code, to allow access to all relevant hardware features of the host machine, and to provide a rational means by which to cope with the evolutionary nature of systems programs. A major feature which contributes to the realization of these goals is a mechanism permitting the definition of the representation of all data structures in terms of the access algorithm for elements of the structure.