[romwell]

Sure, but that still means FORTRAN is an easy language if your intro to programming isn't centered around text processing.

And for many people, it isn't/hasn't been/doesn't have to be.

That's the author's take as well:

>The idea of introductory languages is not necessarily that they are suited to commercial endeavours, but rather that they are (i) easy to implement algorithm in, (ii) readable, and (iii) do not contain things that will confuse and bewilder.