Macro instruction
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{Caegory: Computer Programming|November 2006}} A macro instruction is a line of computer program coding that results in one or more lines of program coding in the target programming language. In the mid 1950s, when assembly language programming was commonly used to write programs for digital computers, the use of macro instructions was initiated for two main purposes: to reduce the amount of program coding that had to be written by generating several assembly language statements from one macro instructions and to enforce program writing standards, e.g. specifying input/output commands in standard ways. Macro instructions were effectively a middle step between assemly language programming and high-level programming languages that followed, such as FORTRAN and COBOL. Two of the earliest programming installations to develop "macro languages" for the IBM 705 computer were at Dow Chemical Corp. in Delaware and the Air Material Command, Ballistics Missile Logistics Office in California. A macro instruction written in the format of the target assembly language would be processed by a macro compiler, which was a pre-processor to the assembler, to generate one or more assembly language instructions to be processed next by the assembler program that will translate the assembly language instructions into machine language instructions. [category: computer programming]
