From:	NAME: Jeremy Dudley
	FUNC: Process Technology
	TEL: 01793 511 711 x 2005 <DUDLEY@SATURNA1@TITAN>
To:	SMTP%"[log in to unmask]"@internet

>2) A Fortran 90 development environment for PC's with DOS, Win 3.11, 
>   Win 95, Win NT (not all of those systems need to be supported by 
>   the same candidate compiler)
>
>I have much less to say about this, because the software is not 
>available for time-limited testing. Thus I only know the names and 
>WWW addresses of some companies but I have no hands-on experience.
>
>Criteria:
>a) ability to handle *all* F90, preferably with F95 or even HPF 
>   features,
>b) quality of diagnostics at compile- and runtime,
>c) ability to handle memory in flat mode (no 64KB pages, no 640 KB 
>  total memory limit, etc.),
>d) quality of the debugging tool and integrated environment (if 
>   available).
>
>Regards,
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>Artur Swietanowski                mailto:[log in to unmask]

For DOS I suspect that you have a choice of Salford compilers only.
For Win 3.x, Salford or Absoft. Absoft *may* have some way of working
from a DOS prompt under a 32-bit DOS extender.

I have not used the Salford compilers.
Absoft will handle all of F90, but not F95. HPF under Windows 3.x
is a non-starter. Points (b) and (c) appear to be well met
based on my use, and the Absoft e-mail support appears good
in handling the more obscure error messages.

I have not used the debugger. The integrated environment
is rather poor, but Absoft are working on a better environment -
by March any comments about their environment could well be
wrong.

Windows 95/NT there are a lot of compilers. I have used
DEC Visual Fortran and Absoft. Same comments about Absoft
under Windows 3.x. DEC is full F90, some F95, under a non-Windows
environment support for HPF. Windows 95, single-processor, again
means that HPF is a non-starter. The compiler appears to have
nothing that makes it 'better' than Absoft - both F90, both
produce code that runs at similar speed. The development
environment for DEC is currently much better than Absoft, but
see the comments above. I have not used the debugging tools
to any great extent - this appears to be a standard Microsoft
debugger (Absoft use their own). I found the debugger
awkward, but this is probably because I am used to
a different debugger, rather than anything real problem
with the system.

If you really want one compiler to support as much of
Windows as possible then Absoft would be preferred over DEC.

Regards,

Jeremy Dudley


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