Garth Foster

Garth H. Foster was a central figure in the development of an APL community outside of IBM. He started the APL Quote Quad, serving as editor of the first volume and distributor until SIGAPL took over publication, and the APL Implementer's Workshop, which continues to be held at the Minnowbrook conference center at Syracuse University, where Foster taught. Foster also helped form SIGAPL (initially STAPL), and served as Chairman from 1973 to 1977. He was the second recipient of the Iverson Award, in 1984.

A professor of electrical and computer engineering at Syracuse University, Foster first encountered APL in 1966 when working on a project with Rome Air Development Center. In subsequent years, he worked to have APL installed on Syracuse's System/360 machine, and to spread knowledge of APL at the university. His efforts created a strong APL community at Syracuse, with graduates including Jim Brown and Roy Sykes.

Conferences

 * APL75: What lies beyond the branch arrow?.
 * APL79: On the locus of program flow within and among secondary functions.
 * IPSA '80: The APL User Community - Its Roots.
 * APL81: Execute and its use. With Will J. Roden.
 * IPSA '82: Standards Update—Will it Ever Mean Anything?
 * APL88: APL2 implementation of numerical asset pricing models. With W. Foote and J. Kraemer.
 * APL88: Efficient evaluation of the area under the normal curve. With J. Kraemer and W. Foote.
 * APL90: Editing and debugging with Windows and a mouse. With Abdelatif Elgouri and Franklin Liu.