Loglan'82: A Forgotten Programming Language Ahead of Its Time

Introduction On March 15, 2025, I had the opportunity to present a six-minute talk as part of Les Conférences Éclair during the Assemblée Générale of APRIL, the French association dedicated to the defense of open source software. My talk focused on Loglan'82, a forgotten but pioneering programming language developed in the 1980s at the Institute of Informatics, University of Warsaw. In this short presentation, I highlighted how Loglan'82 introduced advanced object-oriented programming, secure memory management, and built-in concurrency support—features that were revolutionary at the time and are still relevant today. Despite its technical strengths, the language remained largely confined to academia and never gained widespread industry adoption. My goal was to shed light on this overlooked language and spark interest in its innovative approach to software design, particularly within the free software community. This article expands on my talk, providing a deeper look into the history, key features, and legacy of Loglan'82. Origins and Development The story of Loglan'82 begins with the creation of the MERA-400, one of the first Polish minicomputers. The research team, led by Elżbieta Jezierska-Ziemkiewicz, initially considered using Fortran but found it unsuitable for their needs. Inspired by Simula 67, the team decided to create a new language that could fully leverage object-oriented programming and concurrent execution. Key contributors to Loglan'82 include Andrzej Salwicki, Hanna Oktaba, Wiesława Bartol, and Antoni Kreczmar, among others. The project was ambitious, incorporating features that would later be seen in Java and modern concurrent programming paradigms. Key Features of Loglan'82 Loglan'82 was decades ahead of its time, offering functionalities that even today’s languages struggle to implement efficiently. Object-oriented programming in Loglan'82 was more advanced than in Java, which enforces single inheritance. Loglan'82 allowed multiple inheritance, deep multi-level inheritance, and inheritance within functions and modules. This flexibility provided a more powerful way of structuring software systems. Memory management in Loglan'82 was particularly innovative. It introduced safe object deallocation through the kill(x) instruction, which ensured that once an object was deleted, all references to it were automatically set to none, preventing dangling references. This provided an alternative to garbage collection, offering direct memory management without the risk of memory leaks. Parallel and distributed computing were integral to Loglan'82. The language was designed with processes as first-class objects, enabling true parallel execution. It supported coroutines with built-in suspend and resume functionality, allowing seamless concurrency. A major breakthrough was the Alien Call mechanism, which enabled inter-process communication in a way that was both simpler and more efficient than Java RMI or CORBA. Exception handling was another key feature, providing structured error recovery. The concurrent programming model in Loglan'82 eliminated common pitfalls like race conditions and deadlocks by enforcing structured inter-process communication. Example Code in Loglan'82 The syntax of Loglan'82 was similar to Pascal, making it relatively easy to learn for those familiar with structured programming. The following is a simple example of a "Hello, World!" program: program HelloWorld; begin write("Hello, World!"); end. Loglan'82 is a Typed Language Loglan'82 is a strongly typed programming language, meaning that every variable must be explicitly declared with a specific type before it can be used. This ensures type safety, reducing errors related to unintended type conversions or misuse of data. Unlike dynamically typed languages where variables can hold values of different types at runtime, Loglan'82 enforces strict type rules at compile-time, preventing operations between incompatible types. Types in Loglan'82 According to the provided documentation, Loglan'82 supports the following primitive types: int (integer) – Represents whole numbers, similar to int in C or Java. real (floating-point number) – Used for decimal numbers, equivalent to float or double in modern languages. char (character) – Represents a single character, similar to char in C. bool (boolean) – Can hold the values true or false, used for logical operations. string (string of characters) – Only constant strings are allowed, meaning they cannot be modified at runtime. Complex Types and Data Structures In addition to basic types, Loglan'82 also provides more complex types and structured data representation, allowing programmers to create modular and object-oriented designs. arrayof – Defines an array of a given type, supporting multidimensional and dynamic arrays with runtime-determined bounds. unit : class – Defines a cl

Mar 20, 2025 - 17:27

Loglan'82: A Forgotten Programming Language Ahead of Its Time

Introduction

On March 15, 2025, I had the opportunity to present a six-minute talk as part of Les Conférences Éclair during the Assemblée Générale of APRIL, the French association dedicated to the defense of open source software. My talk focused on Loglan'82, a forgotten but pioneering programming language developed in the 1980s at the Institute of Informatics, University of Warsaw.

In this short presentation, I highlighted how Loglan'82 introduced advanced object-oriented programming, secure memory management, and built-in concurrency support—features that were revolutionary at the time and are still relevant today. Despite its technical strengths, the language remained largely confined to academia and never gained widespread industry adoption. My goal was to shed light on this overlooked language and spark interest in its innovative approach to software design, particularly within the free software community.

This article expands on my talk, providing a deeper look into the history, key features, and legacy of Loglan'82.

Origins and Development

The story of Loglan'82 begins with the creation of the MERA-400, one of the first Polish minicomputers. The research team, led by Elżbieta Jezierska-Ziemkiewicz, initially considered using Fortran but found it unsuitable for their needs. Inspired by Simula 67, the team decided to create a new language that could fully leverage object-oriented programming and concurrent execution.

Key contributors to Loglan'82 include Andrzej Salwicki, Hanna Oktaba, Wiesława Bartol, and Antoni Kreczmar, among others. The project was ambitious, incorporating features that would later be seen in Java and modern concurrent programming paradigms.

Key Features of Loglan'82

Loglan'82 was decades ahead of its time, offering functionalities that even today’s languages struggle to implement efficiently.

Object-oriented programming in Loglan'82 was more advanced than in Java, which enforces single inheritance. Loglan'82 allowed multiple inheritance, deep multi-level inheritance, and inheritance within functions and modules. This flexibility provided a more powerful way of structuring software systems.

Memory management in Loglan'82 was particularly innovative. It introduced safe object deallocation through the kill(x) instruction, which ensured that once an object was deleted, all references to it were automatically set to none, preventing dangling references. This provided an alternative to garbage collection, offering direct memory management without the risk of memory leaks.

Parallel and distributed computing were integral to Loglan'82. The language was designed with processes as first-class objects, enabling true parallel execution. It supported coroutines with built-in suspend and resume functionality, allowing seamless concurrency. A major breakthrough was the Alien Call mechanism, which enabled inter-process communication in a way that was both simpler and more efficient than Java RMI or CORBA.

Exception handling was another key feature, providing structured error recovery. The concurrent programming model in Loglan'82 eliminated common pitfalls like race conditions and deadlocks by enforcing structured inter-process communication.

Example Code in Loglan'82

The syntax of Loglan'82 was similar to Pascal, making it relatively easy to learn for those familiar with structured programming. The following is a simple example of a "Hello, World!" program:

program HelloWorld;

begin
    write("Hello, World!");
end.

Loglan'82 is a Typed Language

Loglan'82 is a strongly typed programming language, meaning that every variable must be explicitly declared with a specific type before it can be used. This ensures type safety, reducing errors related to unintended type conversions or misuse of data. Unlike dynamically typed languages where variables can hold values of different types at runtime, Loglan'82 enforces strict type rules at compile-time, preventing operations between incompatible types.

Types in Loglan'82

According to the provided documentation, Loglan'82 supports the following primitive types:

int (integer) – Represents whole numbers, similar to int in C or Java.
real (floating-point number) – Used for decimal numbers, equivalent to float or double in modern languages.
char (character) – Represents a single character, similar to char in C.
bool (boolean) – Can hold the values true or false, used for logical operations.
string (string of characters) – Only constant strings are allowed, meaning they cannot be modified at runtime.

Complex Types and Data Structures

In addition to basic types, Loglan'82 also provides more complex types and structured data representation, allowing programmers to create modular and object-oriented designs.

arrayof – Defines an array of a given type, supporting multidimensional and dynamic arrays with runtime-determined bounds.
unit : class – Defines a class, which can have attributes and methods. This is an extension of the record-based structures seen in Pascal.
process – A special type used for concurrent programming, where each process is treated as an object.
coroutine – A specialized construct that allows execution to be suspended and resumed, enabling cooperative multitasking.

Type Checking and Safety

Loglan'82 enforces strong type checking at both compile-time and runtime. This means that:

Every variable must be declared with a type before it is used.
Functions and procedures must have clearly defined parameter types and return types.
Operations between different types (e.g., adding an int to a real) require explicit type conversion.
Type safety is guaranteed when handling memory allocation and deallocation, particularly with the kill(x) instruction, which prevents dangling references.

program SumTwoVariables;

const a = 1;
var b, sum: real;

begin
    b := 2.5;
    sum := a + b;
    write("Result: ", sum);
end.

Comparison with Java

Loglan'82 introduced many features that Java adopted years later but in a more structured and efficient manner. Unlike Java, which relies on single inheritance and interfaces, Loglan'82 supported multiple and deep inheritance, providing more flexibility in designing software architectures.

Memory management in Loglan'82 was safer, as the kill(x) instruction ensured objects were properly deallocated, whereas Java relies on garbage collection, which can lead to performance issues.

Concurrency was a fundamental part of Loglan'82. Instead of Java's threads and complex concurrency models requiring frameworks like Spring Cloud or Kubernetes for distributed computing, Loglan'82 included built-in support for processes and coroutines. The Alien Call mechanism provided a more efficient way of handling inter-process communication compared to Java RMI or gRPC.

Characteristic	Loglan'82	Java
Object Model	Multiple and hierarchical inheritance	Single inheritance with interfaces
Memory Management	`kill(x)`, secure object deletion	Automatic Garbage Collector, no manual deletion
Concurrent Programming	Object-based processes, native coroutines	Threads (Thread, ExecutorService), coroutines possible with Kotlin
Distributed Programming	Built-in support (Alien Call)	Requires external tools (Spring Cloud, RMI, gRPC)
Inter-process Communication	Simple, via Alien Call	Complex, via RMI, CORBA, gRPC

Why Did Loglan'82 Fade into Obscurity?

Despite its technical superiority, Loglan'82 did not achieve widespread adoption. One of the main reasons was the lack of industry support. Unlike Java, which was backed by Sun Microsystems, Loglan'82 remained an academic project.

The limited availability of hardware was another factor. The MERA-400 minicomputer, for which Loglan'82 was initially developed, was not widely accessible outside Poland, making it difficult for the language to gain traction.

Another reason for its decline was the rise of C++ and Java in the 1990s. These languages gained traction with strong corporate backing and extensive developer communities, while Loglan'82 remained confined to academia.

Legacy and Influence

Although Loglan'82 is no longer actively used, many of its concepts have influenced modern programming languages. The Alien Call mechanism remains a point of interest in distributed computing, and its memory safety model could still offer insights for future programming languages.

The ideas behind Loglan'82 have resurfaced in recent years, especially in languages like Kotlin and Rust, which emphasize safety, concurrency, and structured object-oriented programming. The systematic approach Loglan'82 took toward multi-level inheritance, coroutines, and inter-process communication shows that its designers were decades ahead of their time.

Conclusion

Loglan'82 was a visionary language, pioneering object-oriented programming, safe memory management, and distributed computing long before they became industry standards. While it may not be widely known, its influence can be seen in modern programming paradigms. For those interested in programming history, Loglan'82 remains an underrated gem worth exploring.

Bibliography on Loglan Language

Wasielewska, Karolina - Cyfrodziewczyny. Krytyka Polityczna Publishing, 2016.
Bartol, Wiesława Maria, et al. - Report on the Loglan 82 Programming Language. Read online.
Ciesielski, Bolesław J. - Alien Call - A Synchronization Mechanism for Distributed Processes. Read online.
Kreczmar, Antoni - A Micro-Manual of the Programming Language LOGLAN-82. Read online.
Salwicki, Andrzej - Loglan Project: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow. Read online.
Salwicki, Andrzej - Which Parallel Virtual Machine? - PVM/MPI, Java RMI, ... or PVLM. Read online.
Salwicki, Andrzej - Invitation to Collaborate: Loglan and LEM'12. Read online.
Institute of Informatics, University of Warsaw - LOGLAN'82 User’s Guide. Read online.
Various Authors - LOGLAN'82 Quick Reference Card. Read online.
Comparison of Object-Oriented Languages - Comparison of Loglan'82 with other Object-Oriented Languages. Read online.