String Oriented Symbolic Language

language (SNOBOL) A string processing language for text and

formula manipulation written by David Farber, Ralph Griswold,

and I. Polonsky of Bell Labs in 1962-3.

SNOBOL had only simple control structures but provided a

rich string-matching formalism of power comparable to regularexpressions but implementated differently. People used it

for simple natural language processing analysis tasks well

into the 1980s. Since then, Perl has come into favour for

such tasks.

SNOBOL was originally called "SEXI" - String EXpression

Interpreter. In spite of the suggestive name, SNOBOL is not

related to COBOL.

Implementations include (in no particular order): SNOBOL2,

SNOBOL3, SNOBOL4, FASBOL, SITBOL, MAINBOL, SPITBOL

and vanilla.

See also EZ, Poplar, SIL and Icon.

["SNOBOL, A String Manipulating Language", R. Griswold et al,

J ACM 11(1):21, Jan 1964].

[When and why was SEXI renamed?]

(1998-03-03)