Editing ALGOL 68 (section)

===Publication===
A draft report was finally published in February 1968. This was met by "shock, horror and dissent",{{sfn|Lindsey|1993|p=9}} mostly due to the hundreds of pages of unreadable grammar and odd terminology. [[Charles H. Lindsey]] attempted to figure out what "language was hidden inside of it",{{sfn|Lindsey|1993|p=12}} a process that took six man-weeks of effort. The resulting paper, "ALGOL 68 with fewer tears",<ref>{{cite journal |title=ALGOL 68 with fewer tears |journal=The Computer Journal |date=1972 |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=176–188 |doi=10.1093/comjnl/15.2.176 |url=https://academic.oup.com/comjnl/article-pdf/15/2/176/1002964/15-2-176.pdf |last1=Lindsey |first1=C. H. }}</ref> was widely circulated. At a wider information processing meeting in [[Zürich]] in May 1968, attendees complained that the language was being forced upon them and that IFIP was "the true villain of this unreasonable situation" as the meetings were mostly closed and there was no formal feedback mechanism. Wirth and [[Peter Naur]] formally resigned their authorship positions in WG2.1 at that time.{{sfn|Lindsey|1993|p=12}}

The next WG2.1 meeting took place in [[Tirrenia]] in June 1968. It was supposed to discuss the release of compilers and other issues, but instead devolved into a discussion on the language. van Wijngaarden responded by saying (or threatening) that he would release only one more version of the report. By this point Naur, Hoare, and Wirth had left the effort, and several more were threatening to do so.{{sfn|Lindsey|1993|p=13}} Several more meetings followed, [[North Berwick]] in August 1968, Munich in December which produced the release of the official Report in January 1969 but also resulted in a contentious Minority Report being written. Finally, at [[Banff, Alberta]] in September 1969, the project was generally considered complete and the discussion was primarily on errata and a greatly expanded Introduction to the Report.{{sfn|Lindsey|1993|p=15}}

The effort took five years, burned out many of the greatest names in [[computer science]], and on several occasions became deadlocked over issues both in the definition and the group as a whole. Hoare released a "Critique of ALGOL 68" almost immediately,<ref name="Hoare1968">{{cite journal |last=Hoare |first=C. A. R. |author-link=Tony Hoare |date=November 1968 |title=Critique of MR93 (Critique of ALGOL 68) |url=https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/1061166.1061173 |journal=[[ALGOL Bulletin]] |volume=29 |pages=27–29}}</ref> which has been widely referenced in many works. Wirth went on to further develop the ALGOL W concept and released this as Pascal in 1970.