Editing INTERCAL (section)

== Impact and discussion ==
In the article "A Box, Darkly: Obfuscation, Weird Languages, and Code Aesthetics",<ref name="nickm">{{cite conference | last = Mateas | first = Michael |author2=Nick Montfort | title = A Box, Darkly: Obfuscation, Weird Languages, and Code Aesthetics | book-title = Proceedings of the 6th Digital Arts and Culture Conference, IT University of Copenhagen, 1–3 December 2005 | pages = 144–153 | url = http://nickm.com/cis/a_box_darkly.pdf }}</ref> INTERCAL is described under the heading "Abandon all sanity, ye who enter here: INTERCAL". The compiler and commenting strategy are among the "weird" features described:

{{quote|The compiler, appropriately named "ick", continues the parody. Anything the compiler can't understand, which in a normal language would result in a compilation error, is just skipped. This "forgiving" feature makes finding bugs very difficult; it also introduces a unique system for adding program comments. The programmer merely inserts non-compileable text anywhere in the program, being careful not to accidentally embed a bit of valid code in the middle of their comment.}}

In "Technomasochism",<ref name=levb>{{cite journal|last=Bratishenko|first=Lev|title=Technomasochism|journal=Cabinet|date= Winter 2009|issue= 36|url=http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/36/bratishenko.php|access-date=2014-05-27}}</ref> Lev Bratishenko characterizes the INTERCAL compiler as a dominatrix:

{{quote|If PLEASE was not encountered often enough, the program would be rejected; that is, ignored without explanation by the compiler. Too often and it would still be rejected, this time for sniveling. Combined with other words that are rarely used in programming languages but appear as statements in INTERCAL, the code reads like someone pleading.}}