APT (programming language)

Douglas T. Ross[2] is considered by many to be the father of APT: as head of the newly created Computer Applications Group of the Servomechanisms Laboratory at MIT in 1956, he led its technical effort.

It was created and refined during the late 1950s and early 1960s to simplify the task of calculating geometry points that a tool must traverse in space to cut the complex parts required in the aerospace industry.

It was a direct result of the new numerical control technology becoming available at that time and the daunting task that a machinist or engineer faced calculating the movements of the machine for the complex parts for which it was capable.

The output from an APT processor may be a cutter location (CL) file which is then run through a post-processor specific to the desired control - machine pair.

These included ADAPT from IBM; EXAPT from Germany; and UNIAPT, initially from United Computing, later used alongside the Unigraphics CADCAM systems.