Kvikkalkul

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Kvikkalkul is an esoteric programming language which was supposedly developed by the Swedish navy in the fifties, though it is generally believed to be a hoax. It made its appearance on the internet in 1994 when it was posted anonymously on alt.folklore.computers.

The author of the usenet post claims that Possession of this information in Sweden can (and will in most cases) lead to Capital Punishment. It should be noted that capital punishment in Sweden was abolished on 1973-01-01. Also, by the 1950s capital punishment was only available in wartime: it was abolished for peacetime crimes on 1921-06-30. The author might be joking, or alluding to extra-judicial executions, or out of date (having used the language in the 1950s and 1960s and presuming wartime conditions).

1000000 Hail Mary's

An example program, provided by the author.

666/ 5
/0 -) 666
:1 -) 550
:0 -) 1010
-) :1
1010:
:1 -) 888
:0 -) 1020
-) :1
1020:
/0 -) 666
:1 -) 1030
:2 -) 1040
:0 -) 1050
:3 -) 560
.9 (- ,0
1030:
.8 (- ,0
1040:
-) :3
1050:
.8 (- .8 -/- ,0005
.8 ( ,49975 -) :2
.9 (- .9 -/- ,0005
.9 ( ,49975 -) :1
:1 -) 666
-) :1

For use, you must type in "hail mary" in the teletype, and then the program will be complete and next time it is run, will make the output. This is because some of the data used by the program must be entered the first time it is run. The program "888" means to complete the program so that it run next time with the data already filled in.

External resources

• Original usenet post (from the Wayback Machine; retrieved on 5 February 2015)
• Kvikkalkul homepage (from the Wayback Machine; retrieved on 1 April 2016), contains documentation and implementations.
• Reference implementation and documentation (from the Wayback Machine; retrieved on 15 August 2000)
• A page about Kvikkalkul