Synergy DBL (Data Business Language) is a

compiled In computing, a compiler is a computer program that translates computer code written in one programming language (the ''source'' language) into another language (the ''target'' language). The name "compiler" is primarily used for programs that ...

imperative programming language In computer science, imperative programming is a programming paradigm of software that uses statements that change a program's state. In much the same way that the imperative mood in natural languages expresses commands, an imperative program con ...

designed for business use. The language was originally called DBL; later it was referred to as Synergy Language; as of 2012 the official name is Synergy DBL. It is based on

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president until ...

’s

DIBOL DIBOL or Digital's Business Oriented Language is a General-purpose programming language, general-purpose, Procedural programming languages, procedural, imperative programming language that was designed for use in Management Information Systems (MI ...

programming language. DBL has an English-like syntax that was designed to be self-documenting and highly readable, but not verbose. The language is procedural and, since 2007 (version 9.1),

object-oriented Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of '' objects''. Objects can contain data (called fields, attributes or properties) and have actions they can perform (called procedures or methods and impleme ...

. Support for

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

’s .NET Framework was added in 2010 (version 9.5). Code is split into two divisions (data and procedure) and uses a rigid hierarchy. The language includes a standard library consisting of 240 built-in subroutines and functions, 10 built-in classes, and 11 APIs that provide functionality such as access to

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing data. It defines a set of rules for encoding electronic document, documents in a format that is both human-readable and Machine-r ...

from within DBL programs and sending and receiving data via HTTP/HTTPS. Synergy DBL is cross-platform, with the current version running on all modern

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

platforms (Windows 7/Server 2008 R2 and higher), as well as on

HP-UX HP-UX (from "Hewlett Packard Unix") is a proprietary software, proprietary implementation of the Unix operating system developed by Hewlett Packard Enterprise; current versions support HPE Integrity Servers, based on Intel's Itanium architect ...

IBM AIX AIX (pronounced ) is a series of Proprietary software, proprietary Unix operating systems developed and sold by IBM since 1986. The name stands for "Advanced Interactive eXecutive". Current versions are designed to work with Power ISA based ...

Oracle Solaris Oracle Solaris is a proprietary Unix operating system offered by Oracle for SPARC and x86-64 based workstations and servers. Originally developed by Sun Microsystems as Solaris, it superseded the company's earlier SunOS in 1993 and became kno ...

, several varieties of

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

and

OpenVMS OpenVMS, often referred to as just VMS, is a multi-user, multiprocessing and virtual memory-based operating system. It is designed to support time-sharing, batch processing, transaction processing and workstation applications. Customers using Op ...

. Applications can be developed on one platform and ported to other platforms. Traditional DBL is implemented as

bytecode Bytecode (also called portable code or p-code) is a form of instruction set designed for efficient execution by a software interpreter. Unlike human-readable source code, bytecodes are compact numeric codes, constants, and references (normal ...

, which is executed by the Synergy Runtime. Synergy .NET programs are CLS-compliant and run under the .NET Framework. DBL is distributed as part of a suite of programming tools sold as Synergy/DE Professional Series by Synergex International Corporation.

History

Synergy DBL is based on

’s

. DBL was developed by Digital Information Systems Corporation (DISC; the company name was changed to Synergex in 1996) in the late 1970s as a DIBOL alternative, targeting system integrators who combined DEC hardware with third-party peripherals. DIBOL ran only on DEC hardware, while DBL ran on most major business computer platforms. By mid-1979, DBL was being sold as a DIBOL-compatible compiler for

PDP-11 The PDP–11 is a series of 16-bit minicomputers originally sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) from 1970 into the late 1990s, one of a set of products in the Programmed Data Processor (PDP) series. In total, around 600,000 PDP-11s of a ...

(and compatibles) running

RT-11 RT-11 (Real-time 11) is a discontinued small, low-end, single-user real-time operating system for the full line of Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-11 16-bit computers. RT-11 was first implemented in 1970. It was widely used for real-time compu ...

and

RSTS/E RSTS () is a multi-user time-sharing operating system developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC, now part of Hewlett-Packard) for the PDP-11 series of 16-bit minicomputers. The first version of RSTS (RSTS-11, #Versions, Version 1) was implem ...

. November 1980: DBL 2.0 released for DEC’s PDP-11- based systems. It compiled and executed programs written in DBL 1.3 or Dibol-11, and ran on

TSX The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX; ) is a stock exchange located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the List of stock exchanges, 10th largest exchange in the world and the third largest in North America based on market capitalization. Based in th ...

, RSTS, and

RSX-11M RSX-11 is a discontinued family of multi-user real-time operating systems for PDP-11 computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. In widespread use through the late 1970s and early 1980s, RSX-11 was influential in the development of later ...

. This was the first

structured Structuring, also known as smurfing in banking jargon, is the practice of executing financial transactions such as making bank deposits in a specific pattern, calculated to avoid triggering financial institutions to file reports required by law ...

version of DBL. New features included an INCLUDE facility, global storage definition, and fixed-length binary I/O. January 1983: VMS native-mode version of DBL released to run on

VAX VAX (an acronym for virtual address extension) is a series of computers featuring a 32-bit instruction set architecture (ISA) and virtual memory that was developed and sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in the late 20th century. The V ...

. At this time, DBL was also available for DEC

, TSX/TSX-Plus, RSTS, and RSX-11M/M-Plus. Summer 1984: Initial version 4 released for

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

. (Other platforms were released in 1985, including VMS and TSX-Plus.) The language was rewritten in C and included support for

virtual memory In computing, virtual memory, or virtual storage, is a memory management technique that provides an "idealized abstraction of the storage resources that are actually available on a given machine" which "creates the illusion to users of a ver ...

, multi-dimensional arrays, and the ability to bind two or more programs together into one executable. December 1984: DBL version 4 released for the AT&T

Unix Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...

operating system. It included the ability to chain to non-DBL programs and interface to subroutines written in other languages. December 1987: First DBL utility announced, a windowing tool designed to simplify the display of menus and help screens. It enabled developers to open up to 256 windows. February 1993: DBL replaced DIBOL on Digital Equipment Corporation’s

Alpha AXP Alpha (original name Alpha AXP) is a 64-bit reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architecture (ISA) developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). Alpha was designed to replace 32-bit VAX complex instruction set computers (C ...

, DEC OSF/1, and Intel-based SCO Unix systems. April 1995: Version 5.7.3 expanded the supported platforms to include

and Microsoft

(Windows 3.1, 95, and NT). April 2007: Version 9.1 added support for

programming, and the compiler was rewritten to support objects and provide better error detection. November 2010: Version 9.5 added support for Microsoft’s .NET Framework, giving programmers access to .NET Framework classes in addition to DBL classes. The language was integrated with Microsoft’s

Visual Studio Visual Studio is an integrated development environment (IDE) developed by Microsoft. It is used to develop computer programs including web site, websites, web apps, web services and mobile apps. Visual Studio uses Microsoft software development ...

. December 2014: Version 10.3 added support for creating programs that can run on Android and

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

devices.

References

{{Authority control Programming languages Programming languages created in 1979 OpenVMS software .NET programming languages Cross-platform software Cross-platform mobile software