#its been a heavy few days icl

[princemick]

saying this with the utmost earnestness but you're exactly the kind of teacher i would have loved to have had in school/uni <33

remy. ur genuinely gonna make me cry here :(( this shit is exhausting but these kids r so fun and I love teaching them n it sucks so much to see them fail just because of a mental block

[aangelinakii]

hey!Could I get Mitch x Reader where they are enemies at first but then they both fall in love with each other like idiots?

NOT FRIENDS

in which you and mitch aren't friends, but you definitely like each other

season : four

character : mitch

song : not friends , loona

warning : mention of like killing zombies , being attacked by zombies ??? but if you've watched / played twdg i'm sure you'd be fine with that but yeahh , oh and swearing yikes

date : 21st october 2021

note : icl i've never rwritten enemies to lovers before so i hope i'm good ahh

out of all people to be on hunting duty with, it just had to be mitch. his usual hunting partner, louis, had sprained his ankle and been deemed unfit to do any hunting or extreme walking of the sort until it had healed (but you thought louis was just faking it so he could sit watch for a bit and cook dinner with omar in the evenings).

heavy in your arm, you hauled your crossbow along, keeping it by your side in case any walkers crossed your path. now halfway out into the safe zone, neither of you had uttered a word.

honestly, you weren't even the one who started it; it always seemed to be mitch — the kid had a problem with everyone, everything. when you'd first arrived at ericson's before the end of the world, you and mitch still didn't get along, no thanks to him. in a class you shared together – chemistry – the two of you were constantly rivalling against each other, competing to see who could get the highest grades, answer the most questions in one lesson, perfect the experiment better. it had started off with you simply answering the questions and doing as you had to in lesson, but mitch took that as a challenge, for he was always top of his chem class. and the petty rivalry followed you down to the apocalypse.

the snap of a twig caused your ears to perk up and your body to freeze; you'd caught eyes on a large hare a good few feet away. mitch had heard, too, and followed suit, creeping behind the trunk of a tree. trying to be as stealthy as possible, you loaded your crossbow, lowering yourself to blend in with the overgrowing dead grass.

holding the sight up to your eyeline, you zeroing in on the hare and pulled the trigger. easy catch.

"and that's one," you spoke up light-heartedly as you stood up, trying to lighten the mood. mitch came out from behind his tree, walking over to the hare, but not without shooting you a gritty glare. "tough crowd..." you mumbled; this time, mitch didn't even spare you a glance.

multiple dead hares in his grip, mitch led you back up to the traps. he'd already gathered the hares that had been caught over the last couple of days in the nearby 'food traps', and the fresh ones from today, but it was also up to the two of you to clean up any walker carcasses that had been caught in your actual traps, specially made to prevent walkers from tearing ericson's walls down. mitch shoved the hares into a drawstring bag and slung it over his shoulders.

now shoved up against trees and splattered on the floor in a pile of undead mush, walkers had set of many of the traps. some of the walkers tacked up against trees were still groaning and reaching out for you and mitch as you stepped by — and there was so many that it would probably take a while to clean everything up. hooray, more time with mitch (note the sarcasm).

you and mitch worked on separate traps, keeping as far away from each other as possible. it would've been helpful for at least one other person to be helping you out, but, of course, louis just didn't feel up to it.

one trap you were working on was a risky one; the walker caught up against the tree was very much alive and thriving — almost too much, you thought. it groaned and cried, making all the god-awful walker noises it could, hitting its fist against the stump pressed up to it in futile attempts to get itself free. if you got this one down, you'd need to be quick and precise with your actions. any wrong move and mitch would have another walker to clean up and one less person to take back to ericson.

you placed the crossbow on the muddy ground and prepared yourself to remove the walker from the tree. your crossbow was probably your best bet, but it was impractical to hold when trying to pry a huge log off a live walker — if needs be, your switchblade was right in your pocket.

with a great huff, you placed a foot on the walker's shin, keeping it in place as you pulled on the large log. after a good few minutes of pushing and pulling, the tree's roots pulled out of the walker's stomach, and the walker fell to the floor.

groaning and gurgling, the walker, with its insides falling outside, crawled towards you unwaveringly. you just had to reach your crossbow, or grab the switchblade from your pocket. when you glanced over at where you'd left your crossbow, it was much too far away, for one of the walker's skeletal hands had placed itself on your foot, its surprising strength keeping you in place as it reached for the other foot.

your hand shot down into your pocket, pulling out the switchblade and flipping open the blade. you quickly examined the walker, looking for a way to defend yourself, but your thoughts and your blade were knocked out of your mind as you tried to take a step back, only to be pushed to the ground by the walker at your feet, rising up your body.

"holy shit!" you cried, bringing your arms up to clamp down on the walker's shoulders as it finally met you face-to-face. its hot intestines spilled out of its front and onto your own shirt; tears pooled in your eyes; the muscles in your arms burned and shook under the walker's weight. "mitch, help! i'm not fucking around— help me!"

quick footsteps padded your way — mitch's — and you heard someone fiddling around with your crossbow. suddenly, an arrow flew into the side of the walker's head, planting itself deep, and it grew limp, no longer putting up a fight. as soon as you shoved the walker off you, you stayed down for a few moments, gaining your breath back, allowing your shaking self to calm. you turned your head over to see mitch, who stood there with an utterly horrified expression on his face, the crossbow in his hand shivering.

he gulped a lump of fear down his throat. "be more careful next time. you should've asked me to help you with this trap," mitch said sternly before throwing the crossbow to the ground and turning back to head off to ericson.

the two of you didn't speak until the next day, where you stood watch (again, courtesy of louis claiming he wasn't fit for working, but was definitely fit for drawing with tenn on one of the picnic benches and singing about his creations loudly). whilst you stood, binoculars held to your eyes, pinpointing the location of each walker in sight, mitch sat down cross-legged, twirling a reed of grass in his fingers. "you owe me, you know," he spoke suddenly, causing you to look down at him in confusion.

he looked back up at you with a blank expression. "for yesterday; i saved you, now you owe me."

it was difficult to disguise the sigh that brushed past your lips. honestly, mitch was the only person to make you owe him right after he saves your damn life.

with a soft scowl, you brought the binoculars back to your optics, ignoring him. "i think louis owes both of us – why don't you ask him for a favour? i'm sure he'd be more than happy to."

mitch glanced over at louis at the bench, who was comparing drawings with tenn. maybe not...

"yeah, but i don't think he can help me with this."

scoffing, you pulled the binoculars away from your face. "oh yeah? then what is it?" you asked with little patience in your voice.

the boy dropped the grass over the edge of the watch post and gazed at it as it floated down to the ground below. "we used to compete against each other over who would do the better experiment in science. do you think we could do it again? you know, for old time's sake."

to be frank, you didn't completely despise the idea. as annoying as mitch was when you got more praise for your experiment, it was funny to see him squirm — in any situation.

a small smile began to crawl onto your face, starting at the corner of your lips. "sure. why not?"

and that's how you found yourself rummaging around in the storage cupboard of your old chemistry classroom.

"did you find any potassium iodide?" mitch called impatiently from behind you. "i got the hydrogen peroxide."

"give me a break!" you called back sharply, staring at the shelves and their worn-out labels. "i haven't been in here in a while. it's not like i try to grasp onto my old grades from when the world wasn't over, unlike some people."

mitch sighed and you heard his sneakers squeak against the hard flooring towards you. before you knew it, he'd lodged himself next to you in the cupboard, grazing his eyes over the labels just as you had. a lot quicker than you had, the boy located the jar of potassium iodide. a smug smirk on his face, he turned to you, waving the bottle in your face, and shuffled out to return to one of the wooden work benches.

you had everything you needed: hydrogen peroxide, potassium iodide, liquid detergent, and two dusty glass measuring flasks. and now all you needed was to begin your experiments, racing against each other to create the better reaction; you know, for old time's sake.

as the two of you worked away, you tossed comments of varying levels of snarkiness in each other's faces.

"do you even remember how to do this?"

"of course i do, i wasn't born yesterday. how about you? looks like you're having trouble with that."

"just you wait."

suddenly, at extremely similar times, the mixture in your flasks foamed up, shooting into the air and spilling all over the work benches. each sizzled and smoked. but yours was just that little bit too slow.

"YES!" mitch exclaimed, throwing his fists in the air in excitement. wow, what a way to rub it in your face.

sighing, you replied, "calm down, mitch, you didn't win the olympics." as annoyed as you wanted to be, a small smile appeared on your lips and a jokey tone filled your voice.

"i might as well have!" he chuckled in return, doing a peculiar victory dance that you couldn't help but laugh at.

"okay, fine, you won," you spoke with feigned annoyance and an overdone roll of your eyes. "are you happy now – now that we're even, you and me?"

mitch nodded happily, a gleeful smile on his face. the freckles along his nose began to form constellations and pretty pictures as if his own face were the sky or a canvas. "yeah, i'm definitely happy now," he chuckled. "you can go off now and do whatever, i'll clean up. catch you later."

you definitely caught him later — two days later to be precise. of course, you'd seen each other around in the meantime, but hadn't properly spoken until now.

this time, you'd gone out into the safe zone again, but this time it was on purpose. it was your turn on setting-traps duty, and mitch had stood up, asking if he could help. since the chemistry competition, he'd seemed nicer now, not exactly smiling at you but not exactly scowling at you either as you passed by him. but if had certainly caught you by surprise to find that he was willingly joining you on your duty when no one else wanted to.

with your crossbow slung over your shoulder, you and mitch walked side-by-side as you approached the traps, some of which had still been set off from the day after clean-up, and willy and marlon had gone out after you guys to set them back into place again. yesterday had been clean-up duty again, but not for you, but now you were back to put everything back in their places.

"maybe it would be better to stick in our pair this time," mitch spoke up in a slightly teasing tone. and it wasn't the harsh teasing you were used to, either, it was definitely a playful one.

a small smile flickered on your lips as you were reminded of your being saved, and you nodded slightly. "yeah, just in case," you agreed.

so the two of you got to work, pushing and pulling heavy tree stumps and rolling large boulders back into place, tying ropes as best as you could. by the time you were done, you'd certainly broken a sweat, having to remove a layer — your jacket — just to begin to cool down again.

breathing heavily, you backed up against a tree, sliding down to a sitting position. mitch joined you, sitting against the other side of it.

as the two of you sat in silence, the tension and awkwardness sizzled in the air. "why did you hate me?" you asked out of the blue. "but you seem to be fine with me now."

mitch didn't respond straight away, but you could hear him shuffling around and clearing his throat softly from his side. "dunno. academic rivals? i always really enjoyed chemistry, and i got good grades, but then you were brought here and you were just as good as me. i wasn't the smart kid in class now, it was both of us. the attention was either on you, or me, and i guess i liked the attention."

you peered around the tree to look at him. he stared down at his hands, grazed from handling the rocks and tough tree bark. "is that it?" you chuckled slightly. "that's a pretty dumb reason."

a smile lay on mitch's face as he breathed out in a laughing manner. "yeah, i guess it was. but i don't hate you anymore, so it's fine."

one of your eyebrows rose. technically, it was fine, but during your stay at ericson's before the apocalypse, you were almost always annoyed just because of him. but, yes, it's fine now.

"what changed?" you asked, and mitch looked over at you.

he quickly looked away with a shrug, his lips tugging into a straight line. "dunno," he stated. "the elephant toothpaste we did reminded me of our chemistry lessons we had, but for once we weren't competing for recognition; we were just doing it for fun." a small smile appeared on his lips instead of a line.

your eyes stayed trained on him for a moment longer, before being pulled out by willy's heavy voice shouting. "y/n! mitch! get back in, the walkers are closing in!" and that was all you needed to grab your crossbow and pick yourself up, and dash back to the gates as mitch followed close behind and willy threw arrows at the nearing walkers.

at dinner that night, mitch had made sure to sit opposite you at the table, although he didn't speak to you. ruby, who sat next to you, flashed you a confused look. everyone had thought mitch was behaving weirdly the past few days, especially towards you; he was known to start up arguments for no reason and get ticked off bu the smallest things, but now he was a lot calmer, at least to you — and no one knew what was up.

"hey, guys, let's get some more food and sit over there," willy spoke aloud in a very unconvincing tone, picking up his bowl and starting to move, with everyone following suit, apart from you and mitch. willy leaned down and whispered to you, "find out what's up with him – please, it's killing us."

great, new mission: mission 'find out what happened to mitch'.

your chewing slowed as you thought about what to say, watching as everyone squashed together to fit on the other bench, further away. you turned to mitch, who was also watching the others. "so, what's up?" you asked, mentally pinching yourself for starting with something so vague.

mitch shrugged, his eyebrows furrowing as he looked down at the remains of his dinner. "uh, nothing much. why did they...?"

he didn't finish — honestly, you didn't know either. obviously they wanted you to ask mitch about his recent change in persona, but it was certainly confusing as to why they felt the need to run off.

"they want to know why you've had a change of heart," you explained in return.

the boy's dark eyebrows furrowed further. "what do you mean 'change of heart'?"

with a glance to the others, you shrugged your shoulders tightly. "they think that you've been acting differently. not a bad different, just less testy, you know, and kinder, i guess. we want to know if everything's okay." you stared up at him, placing the spoon back in your bowl and swallowing your mouthful. "so, is everything okay?"

"well—" mitch began, struggling to choose the best words to answer with. "well, yeah. i just— yeah. yeah, i'm fine."

one of your eyebrows rose. "are you sure? nothing happened?"

mitch hesitated. "well, nothing happened, really. i just... i think i like someone? and i guess i want them to like me back?"

without thinking, you let out a gasp, leaning in out of interest. "really? who?"

his lips pulled into a thin line; a habit he seemed to have. he shook his head. "not saying."

a pout fell onto your lips. damn. what's the fun in knowing he has a crush if you don't actually know who it is? but at least you knew what had happened to make him change his attitude. abruptly, mitch stood up with his empty bowl and went inside. everyone on the other table turned to you curiously.

"he says he has a crush," you repeated on behalf of mitch. "he wants to be nice to them so they like him back, but he wouldn't say who." in reply, a large commotion erupted from the other table, though nothing you could make out.

over the course of the rest of the week and so on, you and mitch seemed to be on better terms than you had been on the whole year. he often volunteered to help you out on whatever duty you had, and went out of his way to get to know you better. now, he knew you less as his chemistry rival and more as the real you, and you knew him less as your own former-academic rival and now as someone completely different. some of the things he'd told you even seemed to surprise the others when you repeated it to them.

by the next week, you and mitch were back on watch duty, sitting at your post. a laugh escaped your lips as mitch uttered a joke he'd thought of earlier that day. after getting past the grime and glaciality, mitch actually wasn't that bad – he made living in the apocalypse just about liveable. he stared down at his hands, which fidgeted with his dirty jeans, his smile big and bashful.

smile still on your face, you looked over at mitch. how did you even end up feeling like this? the person you'd been rivalling against all these years had found a way into your heart, and in such a short time.

"mitch?" you asked, pulling him out from his thoughts. "i think i know who your crush is, and i think they like you back."

[theimpossiblescheme]

Queens About Town

I was paired up with @mister-meowoffelees and her OC Virsilia for @mybonesohno‘s OC-icle Ball, and since I’m no great artist, I wanted to write a short and sweet fic about Virsilia’s relationships with both her mate Demeter and her friend Bustopher Jones!  I hope I’ve done this wonderful OC justice, and I hope you all enjoy this story!

“I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to come and visit,” Demeter laughed unsteadily, leaning on her mate’s arm as they approached the great red canopy reading FOX’S.  “I figured I’d stick out like a sore thumb at these clubs.”

Virsilia merely shook her head before leaning it against Demeter’s to nuzzle her gently.  “Oh, don’t be silly… they’ll love you here, I’m sure of it.”  In truth, even if this was as far as they got—even if Demeter panicked at the last moment and wanted to stay outside or even turn back around and go home—Virsilia was still so proud of her.  She knew how nerve-wracking long trips outside of the Junkyard could be for her, and it took a great deal of persuasion on her part to get her to agree to come.  And Heaviside only knew how many cats were scared to death of Bustopher’s clubs on principle.  But she would be there every step of the way.  When Demeter gave her a shy smile in return, Virsilia squeezed her paw and led her through one of the open windows at the very end.

On the other side was a wide room, warmly lit by the sunlight streaming across the chestnut-colored walls and multicolored bookcases that lined them.  All around them were chairs and little sofas, and each one of them was occupied by a Man and his cat.  Long-haired pudgy cats who were content to sit in someone’s lap and purr, wiry long-legged cats who were looking for something to scratch and summarily getting scolded for it, adolescent kittens who were chatting up their neighbors… all shapes and sizes of feline guests.  Two of them—a fluffy white queen and an imperious-looking gray tom—were looking down at Demeter with heavy, scrutinizing eyes as she passed, but Virsilia just patted her paw and led her away.  Franz and Duchess could judge all they pleased… they weren’t the ones she was here to see.

At the end of a room was a very well-stocked bar and a barkeep in a white apron currently pouring two drinks into a mixer and shaking it vigorously.  Demeter paused for a moment to watch him, rising up slightly on her hind legs and cocking her head curiously.  “What is that… do you know?”

Squinting up at the barkeep, Virsilia watched him pour out a bright orange liquid into a glass and garnish the rim with an orange slice.  “I believe that’s a vodka screwdriver… but you mustn’t quote me on that.”

Demeter gave her a bemused look.  “Why would they call it a screwdriver, though?  It doesn’t look anything like one.”

Virsilia simply shrugged. “Who knows why humans do anything? They have a hard enough time giving us names most of the time.”  That got a smirk and a tiny laugh out of Demeter, so she considered it a small victory.

The barkeep passed the drink over to a heavyset, white-mustachioed man in a thick grey coat sitting at the bar, and Virsilia’s face broke into a wide grin.  “There’s our host… come on, love!”  Beckoning Demeter with her tail, she ran to the base of the man’s chair and stood up against the leg, looking up into his lap and giving its occupant a more gently sardonic smile.  “Are you going to come and greet your guests, or shall I have to show my mate around myself?”

At first there was only a hearty laugh in answer.  Then the man’s lap stirred, and a familiar, similarly heavyset tuxedo cat heaved himself off of the chair and down onto the ground.  “And hello to you as well, my dear,” Bustopher Jones replied, adjusting his monocle with one paw as he gave Virsilia’s a fond shake with the other.  Then he turned around.  “Are my eyes finally going in my age… or is that really young Demeter?”

Demeter laughed, shaking her head slightly.  “I’m not that young anymore, Mr. Jones—I have mates and children now.  And we met at the last Ball, you must remember…”

“Oh, I do.  But I don’t remember seeing you at any of my clubs before.” He lifted her paw and gave it a gallant kiss.  “Welcome to Fox’s, my dear.  And please, friends call me Bustopher.”

Virsilia smiled at the two of them, watching an embarrassed, but pretty blush painting her mate’s cheeks and squeezing her paw again.  “When she told me she’d never been here before, I insisted she come with me to see you. I promised she’d have a wonderful time.”

“Is it always so crowded, though?” Demeter asked, eyes flitting anxiously around them at all the other cats.

“Not usually.  It will empty out soon enough around sundown—I can give you a proper tour then.  But first, you must be famished, coming all this way…”  Gesturing for them to follow, he lead them around the bar and underneath into a cozily dark area littered with pillows for seats and small carboard boxes for tables.  As Demeter and Virsilia took their seats at a box in the corner, Bustopher reached under his chosen pillow and pulled out three small notecards that had been printed with menus.

“Take your time ordering,” he said as he made himself comfortable across from them.  “There’s a particularly delightful array of steaks—I would wager say only the Globe is better.”

“Oh, I’ll probably just get something small,” Demeter said, reading over her menu with an apprehensive look on her face.  “I don’t want to eat too much… and I’m not even sure what half of these are…”

“Darling, you don’t have to be shy,” Virsilia reassured her.  “Cats eat here completely free—you can get whatever you want.  Besides,” she continued in a lower voice, “I know you didn’t eat very much today.”

Her mate’s gaze dropped guiltily into her lap.  “I certainly meant to… you know how it is sometimes… I just couldn’t work up the energy.”

“I know.  And that’s perfectly fine.  But this evening, Bustopher and I want to treat you… and you wouldn’t want to disappoint us, would you?”  She gave her an exaggerated pout, and that got another little laugh out of Demeter in spite of herself.  It always gave Virsilia a little thrill to hear her laugh… she did so seldomly, and it meant the world to her that she could still coax it out of her, even in her darkest moods.

Either not hearing the whole exchange or tactfully pretending not to, Bustopher clapped his paws into the air.  “Garçon!”  A thin brown tom with a towel around his waist came rushing over, and Bustopher gestured toward Demeter, holding out his paw for her to take so she could stand up. “Show our lovely guest some of our dinner trays, will you?  She deserves to know what she shall be served tonight.”

“Oh, that’s all right—I don’t want to leave the table—”

“Nonsense, dear girl. You go and educate yourself, and make some friends along the way.  I’m going to catch up a bit with your mate.”  He gave her a gently chiding look over his monocle, a look he must have given his nephews many times, and Demeter relented, letting go of his paw and turning to the waiter. And extending his arm gracefully, the waiter led her away down the dimly lit corridor formed between the bar and the wall.

Virsilia watched her go, nodding encouragingly until she was out of sight, before laying down her menu—she already had an idea what she wanted.  “Now before you ask, Bustopher, I won’t be treating all of your guests to a dance tonight.  I’m afraid I left my tap shoes back at the Junkyard.”

“The idea hadn’t even crossed my mind.”  Taking off his monocle and polishing it on his cravat, he squinted off in the direction Demeter and the waiter had left.  “But you must tell me… how did the two of you meet?”

For a moment, Virsilia wasn’t sure what to say… well, she was, but she had no idea how to condense it all.  Hers and Demeter’s story was such a long, emotionally taxing one, and no doubt most of it wouldn’t make for very good dinner conversation.  But she hadn’t seen her old friend in such a long time, and so much of her life had changed since then…  “We met shortly after she first returned to the Junkyard.  She had her little girl by then, and… well, she still wasn’t quite sure how to be a mother.  I stepped up to help her and teach her what I knew, and we spent so much time bonding together with little Jemima all the while.  I suppose it was only natural we would fall in love,” she added, unable to help a blush herself that she tried to hide with a paw on her cheek.

“I’d say you’ve been a good influence on her,” Bustopher replied, replacing his monocle.  “I could never have imagined the poor creature I met last year coming all this way, even with someone to lean on.  And I’d imagine that Jemima is no small help herself.”

“Oh, she’s such a sweetheart!” Virsilia exclaimed, melting into a fond smile.  “She’s so much like her mother, so kind and patient… she’s been more help than she realizes.”  Seeing Demeter smile wider than she had in so long, hearing Jemima call the two of them her “moms”—there were few things the world that warmed her heart more.  “Really, all of those kittens there are so sweet. I have to admit, that might be my favorite thing in the Junkyard—just playing with them, spending time with them whenever their parents are busy.  It’s never boring, I can tell you that,” she added with a chuckle.

“I can imagine not.  I always mean to visit more than I have lately, but Old Henry is always milling about between establishments.  Not that I mind at all, you understand,” Bustopher put in quickly, “but I do miss the lot of you on Bristol or Dover days.”

“We’ll have to all take a special trip to come and visit you sometime,” Virsilia suggested.  “I’m sure Skimble knows a train line we can take… and I’m sure Pouncival will be able to behave himself.”  She gave him a mischievous smile across the table, knowing exactly what his answer would be.

And he didn’t disappoint, widening his eyes and giving a small huff of a laugh as if he’d choked on something.  “I say this with affection, my dear… but I wouldn’t hold my breath for that.”

Virsilia just laughed. “Oh, I promise he would be on his best behavior.  Especially if Demeter were there—she’s like a mother to him, too, and he adores her. It’s… really rather difficult not to,” she admitted softly, blushing even harder now and doggedly looking back down at her menu to hide it this time.

Bustopher only gave her a knowing look and smiled back at her.  “I can see that.”  He lifted his gaze above her, and his face unexpectedly lit up.  “Ah, speak of the devil!”

Looking up, Virsilia caught sight of Demeter being escorted back to their table by the same waiter and noted that she seemed a little more relaxed than she’d been before.  “Back so soon, love?”

“It wasn’t quite as complicated as I expected it to be,” Demeter said, nodding her thanks to the waiter before sliding back onto her pillow and brushing her shoulder against her mate’s as she picked up her menu.  “I think I know want I want now.”

The waiter looked expectantly over at Bustopher, who merely waved toward the two queens.  “Ladies first, my dears.  The night is yours.”

[erossiniuk]

Fifty years of Pascal

I don’t know you but it seems yesterday for me I started to code with Basic on my VIC20 and Pascal a couple of years later and now we celebrate fifty years of Pascal. Can’t believe that.

The beginning

In the early 1960s, the languages Fortran (John Backus, IBM) for scientific, and Cobol (Jean Sammet, IBM, and DoD) for commercial applications dominated. Programs were written on paper, then punched on cards, and one waited a day for the results. Programming languages were recognized as essential aids and accelerators of the programming process.

In 1960, an international committee published the language Algol 60. It was the first time a language was defined by concisely formulated constructs and by a precise, formal syntax. Two years later, it was recognized that a few corrections and improvements were needed. Mainly, however, the range of applications should be widened, because Algol 60 was intended for scientific calculations (numerical mathematics) only. Under the auspices of IFIP a Working Group (WG 2.1) was established to tackle this project.

The group consisted of about 40 members with almost the same number of opinions and views about what a successor of Algol should look like. There ensued many discussions, and on occasions the debates ended even bitterly. Early in 1964 I became a member, and soon was requested to prepare a concrete proposal. Two factions had developed in the committee. One of them aimed at a second, after Algol 60, milestone, a language with radically new, untested concepts and pervasive flexibility. It later became known as Algol 68. The other faction remained more modest and focused on realistic improvements of known concepts. After all, time was pressing: PL/1 of IBM was about to appear. However, my proposal, although technically realistic, succumbed to the small majority that favored a milestone.

Poster of Pascal’s syntax diagrams strongly identified with Pascal

The group

It is never sufficient to merely postulate a language on paper. A solid compiler also had to be built, which usually was a highly complex program. In this respect, large industrial firms had an advantage over our Working Group, which had to rely on enthusiasts at universities. I left the Group in 1966 and devoted myself together with a few doctoral students at Stanford University to the construction of a compiler for my proposal. The result was the language Algol W,2 which after 1967 came into use at many locations on large IBM computers. It became quite successful. The milestone Algol 68 did appear and then sank quickly into obscurity under its own weight, although a few of its concepts did survive into subsequent languages.

But in my opinion Algol W was not perfectly satisfactory. It still contained too many compromises, having emerged from a committee. After my return to Switzerland, I designed a language after my own preferences: Pascal. Together with a few assistants, we wrote a user manual and constructed a compiler. In the course of it, we had a dire experience. We intended to describe the compiler in Pascal itself, then translate it manually to Fortran, and finally compile the former with the latter. This resulted in a great failure, because of the lack of data structures (records) in Fortran, which made the translation very cumbersome. After this unfortunate, expensive lesson, a second try succeeded, where in place of Fortran the local language Scallop (M. Engeli) was used.

Pascal

Like its precursor Algol 60, Pascal featured a precise definition and a few lucid, basic elements. Its structure, the syntax, was formally defined in Extended BNF. Statements described assignments of values to variables, and conditional and repeated execution. Additionally, there were procedures, and they were recursive. A significant extension were data types and structures: Its elementary data types were integers and real numbers, Boolean values, characters, and enumerations (of constants). The structures were arrays, records, files (sequences), and pointers. Procedures featured two kinds of parameters, value-and variable-parameters. Procedures could be used recursively. Most essential was the pervasive concept of data type: Every constant, variable, or function was of a fixed, static type. Thereby programs included much redundancy that a compiler could use for checking type consistency. This contributed to the detection of errors, and this before the program’s execution.

Algor

Just as important as addition of features were deletions (with respect to Algol). As C.A.R. Hoare once remarked: A language is characterized not only by what it permits programmers to specify, but even more so by what it does not allow. In this vein, Algol’s name parameter was omitted. It was rarely used, and caused considerable complications for a compiler. Also, Algol’s own concept was deleted, which allowed local variables to be global, to “survive” the activation of the procedure to which it was declared local. Algol’s for statement was drastically simplified, eliminating complex and hard to understand constructs. But the while and repeat statements were added for simple and transparent situations of repetition. Nevertheless, the controversial goto statement remained. I considered it too early for the programming community to swallow its absence. It would have been too detrimental for a general acceptance of Pascal.

Pascal was easy to teach, and it covered a wide spectrum of applications, which was a significant advantage over Algol, Fortran, and Cobol. The Pascal System was efficient, compact, and easy to use. The language was strongly influenced by the new discipline of structured programming, advocated primarily by E.W. Dijkstra to avert the threatening software crisis (1968).

Pascal was published in 1970 and for the first time used in large courses at ETH Zurich on a grand scale. We had even defined a subset Pascal-S and built a smaller compiler, in order to save computing time and memory space on our large CDC computer, and to reduce the turnaround time for students. Back then, computing time and memory space were still scarce.

Pascal’s Spread and Distribution

Soon Pascal became noticed at several universities, and interest rose for its use in classes. We received requests for possible help in implementing compilers for other large computers. It was my idea to postulate a hypothetical computer, which would be simple to realize on various other mainframes, and for which we would build a Pascal compiler at ETH. The hypothetical computer would be quickly implementable with relatively little effort using readily available tools (assemblers). Thus emerged the architecture Pascal-P (P for portable), and this technique proved to be extremely successful. The first clients came from Belfast (C.A.R. Hoare). Two assistants brought two heavy cartons of punched cards to Zurich, the compiler they had designed for their ICL computer. At the border, they were scrutinized, for there was the suspicion that the holes might contain secrets subject to custom fees. All this occurred without international project organizations, without bureaucracy and research budgets. It would be impossible today.

An interesting consequence of these developments was the emergence of user groups, mostly of young enthusiasts who wanted to promote and distribute Pascal. Their core resided under Andy Mickel in Minneapolis, where they regularly published a Pascal Newsletter. This movement contributed significantly to the rapid spread of Pascal.

First microcomputer

Several years later the first microcomputers appeared on the market. These were small computers with a processor integrated on a single chip and with 8-bit data paths, affordable by private persons. It was recognized that Pascal was suitable for these processors, due to its compact compiler that would fit into the small memory (64K). A group under Ken Bowles at the University of San Diego, and Philippe Kahn at Borland Inc. in Santa Cruz surrounded our compiler with a simple operating system, a text editor, and routines for error discovery and diagnostics. They sold this package for $50 on floppy disks (Turbo Pascal). Thereby Pascal spread immediately, particularly in schools, and it became the entry point for many to programming and computer science. Our Pascal manual became a best-seller.

This spreading did not remain restricted to America and Europe. Russia and China welcomed Pascal with enthusiasm. This I became aware of only later, during my first travels to China (1982) and Russia (1990), when I was presented with a copy of our manual written in (for me) illegible characters and symbols.

Pascal’s Successors

But time did not stand still. Rapidly computers became faster, and therefore demands on applications grew, as well as those on programmers. No longer were programs developed by single persons. Now they were being built by teams. Constructs had to be offered by languages that supported teamwork. A single person could design a part of a system, called a module, and do this relatively independently of other modules. Modules would later be linked and loaded automatically. Already Fortran had offered this facility, but now a linker would have to verify the consistency of data types also across module boundaries. This was not a simple matter!

Modules with type consistency checking across boundaries were indeed the primary extension of Pascal’s first successor Modula-2 (for modular language, 1979). It evolved from Pascal, but also from Mesa, a language developed at Xerox PARC for system programming, which itself originated from Pascal. Mesa, however, had grown too wildly and needed “taming.” Modula-2 also included elements for system programming, which admitted constructs that depended on specific properties of a computer, as they were necessary for interfaces to peripheral devices or networks. This entailed sacrificing the essence of higher languages, namely machine-independent programming. Fortunately, however, such parts could now be localized in specific “low-level” modules, and thereby be properly isolated.

Apart from this, Modula contained constructs for programming concurrent processes (or quasiparallel threads). “Parallel programming” was the dominant theme of the 1970s. Overall, Modula-2 grew rather complex and became too complicated for my taste, and for teaching programming. An improvement and simplification appeared desirable.

Oberon

From such deliberations emerged the language Oberon, again after a sabbatical at Xerox PARC. No longer were mainframe computers in use, but powerful workstations with high-resolution displays and interactive usage. For this purpose, the language and interactive operating system Cedar had been developed at PARC. Once again, a drastic simplification and consolidation seemed desirable. So, an operating system, a compiler, and a text editor were programmed at ETH for Oberon. This was achieved by only two programmers—Wirth and Gutknecht—in their spare time over six months. Oberon was published in 1988. The language was influenced by the new discipline of object-oriented programming. However, no new features were introduced except type extension. Thereby for the first time a language was created that was not more complex, but rather simpler, yet even more powerful than its ancestor. A highly desirable goal had finally been reached.

Even today Oberon is successfully in use in many places. A breakthrough like Pascal’s, however, did not occur. Complex, commercial systems are too widely used and entrenched. But it can be claimed that many of those languages, like Java (Sun Microsystems) and C# (Microsoft) have been strongly influenced by Oberon or Pascal.

Around 1995 electronic components that are dynamically reprogrammable at the gate level appeared on the market. These field programmable gate arrays (FPGA) can be configured into almost any digital circuit. The difference between hardware and software became increasingly diffuse. I developed the language Lola (logic language) with similar elements and the same structure as Oberon for describing digital circuits. Increasingly, circuits became specified by formal texts, replacing graphical circuit diagrams. This facilitates the common design of hardware and software, which has become increasingly important in practice.

Download and run Turbo Pascal in DosBox

Now, if you want to run Turbo Pascal on your Windows 10 machine, you need an virtual environment where MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System) can run under Windows.

So, I found DosBox Frontend Reloaded. D-Fend Reloaded is a graphical environment for DOSBox. DOSBox emulates a complete computer including the DOS command line and allows to run nearly all old DOS based games on modern hardware with any of the newer Windows versions.

With DOSBox there is no need to worry about memory managers or free conventional RAM, but the setup of DOSBox is still a bit complicated. The configuration of DOSBox via textbased setup files might be difficult for beginners. D-Fend Reloaded may help and create these files for you. Additionally the D-Fend Reloaded installation package contains DOSBox (including all lanuage files currently available), so there is only one installation to be run and no need to link D-Fend Reloaded with DOSBox manually. Now, install D-Fend following the wizard.

Then, you can download a copy of Turbo Pascal 7.1 from Vetusware.com that collects free abandonware.

After the installation of D-Fend, under your user in Windows 10, you find D-Fend Reloaded folder and in it VirtualHD folder.

Where is the VirtualHD for D-Fend Reloaded?

In VirtualHD folder, create a new folder like TP7 and in this one extract the file from Vetusware.com.

Extract file for Turbo Pascal 7

Now, run D-Fend Reloaded and click on the button Add and select Add with wizard. Skip the first page of the wizard and them you have to select the Program to be started. Click on the button at the end of the textbox and then select TURBO.EXE under BIN under TP7.

Create new profile

Click Next until the end of the wizard. Then, from the list, right-click on the profile you have just created and select Edit. Then, click on DOS environment and check the PATH

Z:\;C:\TP7;C:\TP7\UTILS;C:\TP7\UNITS;C:\TP7\EXE;

Profile editor for Turbo Pascal

Then, you are ready. Double click on the profile and your Turbo Pascal 7.1 is up and running.

Turbo Pascal 7.1

Do you remember the Help? Ok, I know, this is a sign of my age.

Turbo Pascal 7.1 Help

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