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## <a id="pal-iii" name="pal3"></a>PAL-III
| **Introduced** | August 1965
| **Manual** | [PDF, 790 kB](http://www.telegraphics.com.au/doc/paliii.pdf)
| **Delivery** | paper tape
We may presume from the name that PAL-III has two predecessors. I was able to find a reference to DEC product number 5-1-S, the Program Assembly Language for the PDP-5 in [the PDP-5 program catalog][pc5] from December 1964. That catalog also says that the replacement for PAL for the PDP-5 is [an early version of PAL-III][p83s] for the PDP-8! This is not surprising, as the PDP-8 directly replaced the PDP-5 in DEC's product line, being upward compatible with it. I have not been able to find a reference to PAL-II. Perhaps it went the way of Angular 3, Winamp 4, Netscape 5, PHP 6, MySQL 7, QuickTime 8, and Windows 9.
We may presume from the name that PAL-III has at least two predecessors. I was able to find a reference to DEC product number 5-1-S, the Program Assembly Language for the PDP-5 in [the PDP-5 program catalog][pc5] from December 1964; we may reasonably call this assembler PAL-I. That catalog also says that the replacement for PDP-5 PAL is [an early version of PAL-III][p83s] for the PDP-8. This makes sense, because the PDP-8 directly replaced the PDP-5 in DEC's product line, being upward compatible with it.
I have yet to come across a reference to anything called "PAL-II." Perhaps it went the way of Angular 3, Winamp 4, Netscape 5, PHP 6, MySQL 7, QuickTime 8, and Windows 9.
The introduction date is for the earliest PAL-III manual I have found, but clearly we may extend it at least back to December 1964. An [early PDP-5 brochure][pdp5b] I found from March 1964 speaks of a "Symbolic Assembler" rather than PAL; is that just marketing-speak, or does PAL first date to somewhere in that range?
The introduction date above is the publication date of the earliest PAL-III manual I have found, but clearly PAL's ancestry dates back to at least December 1964. An [early PDP-5 brochure][pdp5b] I found from March 1964 speaks of a "Symbolic Assembler" rather than PAL; is that just marketing-speak for "PAL," or does PAL first date to somewhere in that range?
The PAL-III assembler shipped on [punched paper tape](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punched_tape) as part of the grandiosely-named "PDP-8 Assembly System." This amounted to an assembler, an editor, a debugger, and a loader, each a separate paper tape. The programmer would first toggle the RIM loader into the PDP-8's front panel, then use that to load the BIN loader from a fifth paper tape, separate from the PDP-8 Assembly System, then run each of these tapes through the paper tape reader repeatedly — reusing the still-in-core BIN loader each time — in order to iterate his way toward a working program!
The PAL-III assembler shipped on [punched paper tape](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punched_tape) as part of the grandiosely-named "PDP-8 Assembly System." This amounted to an assembler, an editor, a debugger, and a loader, each a separate paper tape. The programmer would first toggle the RIM loader into the PDP-8's front panel, then use that to load the BIN loader from a fifth paper tape, separate from the PDP-8 Assembly System, then run each of these tapes through the paper tape reader repeatedly — reusing the still-in-core BIN loader each time — in order to iterate his way toward a working program.
The PAL-III assembler tape required at least two passes through the tape reader in order to produce a computer-readable BIN format output tape, plus an optional third pass if you also wanted a human-readable listing on the teletype.
If you look at pictures of PDP-8 computers, you can often see a tray with narrow slots in it, each meant to hold one of these key paper tapes, as they were needed near at hand when using a paper-tape based PDP-8. There is a good picture of a blue one on the cover of the [OS/8 Handbook][os8m], 1974 ed.
PAL-III can be considered the baseline assembler for a PDP-8, since for roughly its first decade, PDP-8s sold for interactive use came with a Teletype Model 33 ASR with built-in paper tape reader and punch, which meant the ability to read paper tapes was a baseline feature for interactively-used PDP-8s. (Contrast headless embedded PDP-8s, a very common use for the PDP-8 prior to the introduction of the microprocessor.)
PAL-III can be considered the baseline assembler for a PDP-8, since for roughly its first decade, PDP-8s sold for interactive use came with a Teletype Model 33 ASR with built-in paper tape reader and punch, which meant the ability to read paper tapes was a baseline feature for interactively-used PDP-8s. (Contrast [headless][hlc] embedded PDP-8s, a very common use for the PDP-8 prior to the introduction of the microprocessor.)
More importantly for our purposes here, most of the other assemblers surveyed here share PAL-III's basic syntax. This doubtless follows on from the prior point, since it meant PAL-III had the first-mover advantage.
More importantly for our purposes here, most of the other assemblers surveyed here share PAL-III's basic syntax. This doubtless follows on from the prior point, since it meant PAL-III had the [first-mover advantage][fma].
A brief summary of the feature set of PAL-III:
* Full support of the PDP-8 instruction set:
* All basic processor instructions and several microcoded combinations (`CIA`, `SPA`, etc.) predefined
* Many peripheral IOT instructions predefined:
* auto-restart type KR01
* DECtape types 555 and TU55
* EAE options for PDP-5 and PDP-8
* high-speed punch/reader
* [Teletype Model 33 ASR][asr33] keyboard/printer and tape punch/reader
* [high-speed paper tape punch][pp8i] and reader
* DECtape types [555][dt555] and [TU55][tu55]
* auto-restart type [KR01][kr01]
* [Type 182 EAE][t182]
* interrupt controller
* line printer type 645
* line printer type 645 (Analex?)
* teletype/punch
* terminal keyboard/reader
* and many more less well-known peripherals!
[p83s]: http://www.ricomputermuseum.org/Home/equipment/pdp-8s/pdp-8-software
[tu55]: https://archive.org/details/bitsavers_decdectape_3543487
## <a id="macro-8"></a>MACRO-8
| **Introduced** | October 1965
| **Manual** | [PDF, 1.7 MB](https://www.grc.com/pdp-8/docs/MACRO-8_Programming_Manual.pdf)
| **Delivery** | paper tape
|