Computer-drawn flowcharts

ABSTRACT

To meet the need for improved documentation of written computer programs, a simple system for effective communication is presented, which has shown great promise. The programmer describes his program in a simple format, and the computer prepares flow charts and other cross-referenced listings from this input. The description can be kept up-to-date easily, and the final output clearly explains the original program. The system has also proved to be a valuable debugging and coding aid.

REFERENCES

• 1: HAIBT, LOIS M. A program to draw multilevel flow charts. Proc. Western Joint Comp. Conf., 1959, 131-137.
• 2: W. T. Gant, Flow outlining—a substitute for flow charting, Communications of the ACM, v.2 n.11, p.17, Nov. 1959 [doi>10.1145/368481.368505]
• 3: AARONSON, DAVID A., AND KINNAMAN, CLARISSA g. Production of large and variable size logic block diagrams on a high speed digital computer. AIEE paper CP 61-1116, Oct. 1961. (This paper includes a valuable bibliography of the subject.)
• 4: FORTRAN II routine block chart (annotated). Document UP-3843.1, Univac Div. Sperry Rand Corp., 1963. (To adequately understand this document, the reader should be familiar with the FORTRAN II input language of this particular implementation, and with the UNIVAC Solid-State computer machine language.)
• 5: ERSHOV, A. P. Programming Programme for the BESM Computer. Tr. from Russian by M. Nadler, Pergamon Press, 1959.
• 6: Victor H. Yngve , Jean E. Sammet, Toward better documentation of programming languages: introduction, Communications of the ACM, v.6 n.3, p.76, March 1963 [doi>10.1145/366274.366280]
• 7: IBM 7090/7094 IBSYS-IOEX Programming System Analysis Guide. IBM Form C28-6299, IBM Corp., 1963. This document, which has just come to the attention of the author, includes flowcharts printed in a pleasing format by computer. Unfortunately no mention is made of the input language for this program.