Silverfrost FTN95

Silverfrost FTN95: Fortran for Windows

Developer(s)	Silverfrost
Stable release	8.05 / June 20, 2016
Operating system	Microsoft Windows
Type	Compiler
License	Proprietary
Website	http://www.silverfrost.com

Silverfrost FTN95: Fortran for Windows is a Fortran compiler for Microsoft Windows. It generates code for native IA-32 Win32, x86-64 and for Microsoft's .NET platform. FTN95 comes in three licensed editions: Commercial, Academic and Personal. The Personal edition is free and is designed for personal use. Programs written with the Personal edition show a banner for a short time when they are run.

CHECKMATE

FTN95, like it predecessor FTN77, has strong run-time checking options, collectively called CHECKMATE. Compiler switches can turn on various levels of run-time checking. These include array bound checks, constant modification, DO LOOP modification, argument checking and undefined variable use. Program run-times are increased when checking is used.^[1]

ClearWin+

ClearWin+ is a library built into the FTN95 run-time system. It offers an easy to use interface to the Windows API and is not available when producing .NET code. It makes use of a set of format codes and call-backs. The format codes resemble C style printf codes. ClearWin+ is used to power the UI for Simfit. From FTN95 version 7.00 a 64-bit version of ClearWin+ is included. This can be used with existing, free, 64-bit compilers. From version 8.00 on-wards FTN95 can compile to 32- or 64-bits.^[2]

A simple ClearWin+ program:

    INTEGER i,winio@
    EXTERNAL func
    i=winio@('Press this to see what happens &')
    i=winio@('%^bt[PRESS]',func)
    END

c---Function to do something---
    INTEGER function func()
    func=1
    END

Visual Studio

FTN95 was the first Fortran compiler capable of producing code for Microsoft .NET. In addition plug-ins are available that allows FTN95 programs to be written, compiled and debugged inside Visual Studio. The plug-ins fully support Win32 and .NET code generation. The current release has plug-ins for Visual Studio 2008, 2010, 2012, 2013 and 2015. The FTN95 plug-ins can be installed into Visual Studio Community Edition.

Plato

Plato is the Integrated Development Environment supplied with FTN95. It can edit, compile and debug programs in a manner similar to the Visual Studio plug-ins. Although Plato specialises in Fortran it is not limited to it and can be tuned to work with any compiler. It is designed to stand-alone from FTN95.

Salford Fortran

FTN95 was developed by Salford Software Limited, a company owned by University of Salford, and is the successor to their Fortran 77 compiler FTN77. In August 2004 Salford Software relinquished control of FTN95 to Silverfrost Limited. Silverfrost FTN95 is often referred to as Salford FTN95 because of its University of Salford pedigree.

References

1. Silverfrost. "CHECKMATE: The World's Best Runtime Checking". www.silverfrost.com. Retrieved 2016-06-04.
2. Silverfrost. "FTN95 Revision History". www.silverfrost.com. Retrieved 2016-06-04.