The GCC Steering Committee approved the inclusion of the frontend in the GCC codebase gcc-a68 to support the programming language Algol 68 (Algol 68), developed in the late 60s century. After integrating the frontend, the standard GCC tools can be used to compile programs in Algol 68 without the need to install the GNU Algol 68 compiler. The frontend will be available in experimental mode in the release of GCC 16, scheduled for next spring.
The frontend for ALGOL 68 is added with some caveats: it will not be included in default builds and will not be taken into account when assessing GCC’s release readiness. In addition, developers who are not responsible for frontend development for ALGOL 68 are given the opportunity to refuse to work on issues related to that frontend. In case of maintenance problems, the frontend will be removed.
Currently, GCC includes frontends for the languages C, C++, Objective C, Objective C++, Fortran, Ada, Go, D, Modula-2, Rust and Cobol. Frontends are being developed separately GNU Pascal Compiler (GPC), Mercury, Modula-3, GHDL (VHDL), PL/1 and GCC Unified Parallel C(GCC UPC).