Reads a Line of Input, Including Leading and Embedded Spaces, and Stores It in a String Object.

Family unit of programming languages

Basic

Atari Basic (1979) for the Atari 8-bit family
Epitome	Non-structured, later on procedural, subsequently object-oriented
Designed by	John Grand. Kemeny Thomas E. Kurtz
First appeared	May 1, 1964; 57 years ago  (1964-05-01)
Major implementations
Dartmouth BASIC Tiny Bones Applesoft Bones Atari Bones Sinclair Basic Commodore Bones BBC BASIC TI-BASIC Casio Bones Microsoft Basic QB64 Liberty BASIC PowerBASIC QuickBASIC
Influenced by
ALGOL sixty FORTRAN Two JOSS
Influenced
COMAL Ring[one] Visual Basic Visual Basic .NET GRASS
Basic Programming at Wikibooks

BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Didactics Lawmaking)^[2] is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John Yard. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College in 1964. They wanted to enable students in non-scientific fields to utilize computers. At the time, nearly all computers required writing custom software, which only scientists and mathematicians tended to acquire.

In improver to the program language, Kemeny and Kurtz developed the Dartmouth Time Sharing Organisation (DTSS), which allowed multiple users to edit and run BASIC programs simultaneously on remote terminals. This general model became very popular on minicomputer systems like the PDP-11 and Data Full general Nova in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Hewlett-Packard produced an entire computer line for this method of operation, introducing the HP2000 series in the late 1960s and continuing sales into the 1980s. Many early video games trace their history to one of these versions of Basic.

The emergence of microcomputers in the mid-1970s led to the evolution of multiple BASIC dialects, including Microsoft BASIC in 1975. Due to the tiny master memory available on these machines, oftentimes 4 KB, a variety of Tiny Basic dialects was as well created. Basic was available for almost whatsoever system of the era, and became the de facto programming linguistic communication for home computer systems that emerged in the late 1970s. These PCs near always had a BASIC interpreter installed by default, oftentimes in the machine's firmware or sometimes on a ROM cartridge.

BASIC declined in popularity in the 1990s, every bit more powerful microcomputers came to market and programming languages with advanced features (such as Pascal and C) became tenable. In 1991, Microsoft released Visual Basic, combining an updated version of Basic with a visual forms builder. This reignited use of the language and "VB" remains a major programming language^{[ citation needed ]} in the forms of VBA and VB.Cyberspace.

Origin [edit]

John Yard. Kemeny was the math department chairman at Dartmouth Higher. Based largely on his reputation equally an innovator in math teaching, in 1959 the school won an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation award for $500,000 to build a new department building.^[3] Thomas E. Kurtz had joined the department in 1956, and from the 1960s Kemeny and Kurtz agreed on the demand for programming literacy among students outside the traditional STEM fields. Kemeny after noted that "Our vision was that every student on campus should accept access to a computer, and whatever kinesthesia member should be able to apply a computer in the classroom whenever appropriate. It was as simple every bit that."^[4]

Kemeny and Kurtz had fabricated two previous experiments with simplified languages, DARSIMCO (Dartmouth Simplified Code) and DOPE (Dartmouth Oversimplified Programming Experiment). These did not progress by a single freshman grade. New experiments using Fortran and ALGOL followed, but Kurtz ended these languages were too tricky for what they desired. As Kurtz noted, Fortran had numerous oddly-formed commands, notably an "well-nigh incommunicable-to-memorize convention for specifying a loop: 'DO 100, I = one, 10, 2'. Is it 'ane, 10, 2' or '1, 2, 10', and is the comma after the line number required or non?"^[4]

Moreover, the lack of any sort of immediate feedback was a key problem; the machines of the era used batch processing and took a long time to complete a run of a program. While Kurtz was visiting MIT, John McCarthy suggested that time-sharing offered a solution; a unmarried car could divide up its processing fourth dimension among many users, giving them the illusion of having a (tedious) computer to themselves.^[5] Small programs would return results in a few seconds. This led to increasing involvement in a system using time-sharing and a new language specifically for use by non-Stalk students.^[iv]

Kemeny wrote the first version of BASIC. The acronym BASIC comes from the name of an unpublished newspaper by Thomas Kurtz.^[6] The new linguistic communication was heavily patterned on FORTRAN 2; statements were one-to-a-line, numbers were used to signal the target of loops and branches, and many of the commands were like or identical to Fortran. However, the syntax was inverse wherever it could exist improved. For instance, the hard to retrieve DO loop was replaced by the much easier to remember FOR I = 1 TO 10 STEP 2, and the line number used in the Do was instead indicated past the NEXT I.^[a] Also, the cryptic IF statement of Fortran, whose syntax matched a particular educational activity of the machine on which it was originally written, became the simpler IF I=5 And then GOTO 100. These changes fabricated the language much less idiosyncratic while however having an overall structure and feel similar to the original FORTRAN.^[4]

The project received a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, which was used to purchase a GE-225 calculator for processing, and a Datanet-30 realtime processor to handle the Teletype Model 33 teleprinters used for input and output. A team of a dozen undergraduates worked on the projection for about a year, writing both the DTSS system and the BASIC compiler.^[four] The showtime version Basic language was released on 1 May 1964.^{[7] [eight]}

Initially, BASIC full-bodied on supporting straightforward mathematical piece of work, with matrix arithmetic support from its initial implementation as a batch language, and character string functionality being added by 1965. Usage in the university rapidly expanded, requiring the chief CPU to exist replaced by a GE-235,^[4] and yet later by a GE-635. By the early on 1970s there were hundreds of terminals connected to the machines at Dartmouth, some of them remotely.

Wanting use of the language to become widespread, its designers made the compiler bachelor free of accuse. In the 1960s, software became a chargeable commodity; until then, it was provided without charge as a service with the very expensive computers, usually available but to charter. They too made it bachelor to high schools in the Hanover, New Hampshire area and regionally throughout New England on Teletype Model 33 and Model 35 teleprinter terminals connected to Dartmouth via dial-upwardly phone lines, and they put considerable endeavour into promoting the language. In the post-obit years, every bit other dialects of Basic appeared, Kemeny and Kurtz'south original Bones dialect became known as Dartmouth BASIC.

New Hampshire recognized the accomplishment in 2022 when it erected a highway historical marker in Hanover describing the cosmos of "the kickoff convenient programming language".^[9]

Spread on time-sharing services [edit]

The emergence of Basic took place every bit office of a wider movement towards time-sharing systems. Showtime conceptualized during the tardily 1950s, the thought became and then ascendant in the computer industry by the early 1960s that its proponents were speaking of a hereafter in which users would "buy time on the computer much the same manner that the average household buys power and water from utility companies".^[10]

General Electric, having worked on the Dartmouth project, wrote their own underlying operating organization and launched an online fourth dimension-sharing system known every bit Marking I. It featured BASIC as one of its primary selling points. Other companies in the emerging field quickly followed suit; Tymshare introduced SUPER BASIC in 1968, CompuServe had a version on the DEC-10 at their launch in 1969, and past the early 1970s Bones was largely universal on full general-purpose mainframe computers. Even IBM eventually joined the club with the introduction of VS-BASIC in 1973.^[11]

Although fourth dimension-sharing services with Basic were successful for a time, the widespread success predicted before was not to be. The emergence of minicomputers during the aforementioned menstruation, and especially depression-cost microcomputers in the mid-1970s, immune anyone to purchase and run their own systems rather than buy online time which was typically billed at dollars per infinitesimal.^{[b] [12]}

Spread on minicomputers [edit]

The HP 2000 arrangement was designed to run time-shared Basic as its primary task.

BASIC, by its very nature of being small, was naturally suited to porting to the minicomputer market, which was emerging at the aforementioned time every bit the time-sharing services. These machines had very small main memory, perhaps as little equally 4 KB in modern terminology,^[c] and lacked high-performance storage similar hard drives that brand compilers practical. On these systems, BASIC was normally implemented as an interpreter rather than a compiler due to the reduced demand for working memory.^[d]

A particularly important instance was HP Time-Shared Bones, which, like the original Dartmouth organization, used ii computers working together to implement a time-sharing system. The first, a depression-end machine in the HP 2100 series, was used to command user input and save and load their programs to tape or deejay. The other, a high-end version of the same underlying machine, ran the programs and generated output. For a toll of most $100,000, one could own a car capable of running between 16 and 32 users at the same time.^[thirteen] The system, bundled as the HP 2000, was the start mini platform to offer time-sharing and was an immediate runaway success, catapulting HP to become the third-largest vendor in the minicomputer space, behind DEC and Data Full general (DG).^[14]

Dec, the leader in the minicomputer space since the mid-1960s, had initially ignored Bones. This was due to their work with RAND Corporation, who had purchased a PDP-6 to run their JOSS language, which was conceptually very like to Bones.^[15] This led Dec to introduce a smaller, cleaned up version of JOSS known equally FOCAL, which they heavily promoted in the late 1960s. However, with timesharing systems widely offering BASIC, and all of their competition in the minicomputer infinite doing the aforementioned, DEC's customers were clamoring for BASIC. After management repeatedly ignored their pleas, David H. Ahl took information technology upon himself to buy a Bones for the PDP-eight, which was a major success in the teaching market place. Past the early 1970s, FOCAL and JOSS had been forgotten and BASIC had become most universal in the minicomputer market.^[16] Dec would get on to introduce their updated version, BASIC-PLUS, for use on the RSTS/E time-sharing operating system.

During this menstruum a number of elementary text-based games were written in BASIC, well-nigh notably Mike Mayfield's Star Trek. David Ahl collected these, some ported from FOCAL, and published them in an educational newsletter he compiled. He later on collected a number of these into book form, 101 Basic Computer Games, published in 1973.^[17] During the same menstruation, Ahl was involved in the creation of a modest figurer for education utilize, an early personal computer. When management refused to support the concept, Ahl left December in 1974 to found the seminal estimator mag, Creative Computing. The book remained popular, and was re-published on several occasions.^[eighteen]

Explosive growth: the dwelling house computer era [edit]

"Train Basic every day!"—reads a affiche (lesser heart) in a Russian school (c. 1985–1986)

The introduction of the first microcomputers in the mid-1970s was the start of explosive growth for BASIC. It had the reward that it was fairly well known to the immature designers and estimator hobbyists who took an interest in microcomputers, many of whom had seen BASIC on minis or mainframes. Despite Dijkstra'due south famous sentence in 1975, "It is practically impossible to teach proficient programming to students that accept had a prior exposure to BASIC: every bit potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration",^[19] BASIC was one of the few languages that was both high-level enough to be usable by those without grooming and minor enough to fit into the microcomputers of the day, making it the de facto standard programming linguistic communication on early microcomputers.

The kickoff microcomputer version of Basic was co-written by Nib Gates, Paul Allen and Monte Davidoff for their newly formed company, Micro-Soft. This was released by MITS in punch record format for the Altair 8800 shortly after the machine itself,^[20] immediately cementing BASIC as the master linguistic communication of early on microcomputers. Members of the Homebrew Estimator Club began circulating copies of the program, causing Gates to write his Open Letter to Hobbyists, complaining nearly this early example of software piracy.

Partially in response to Gates'south letter, and partially to brand an even smaller BASIC that would run usefully on iv KB machines,^[e] Bob Albrecht urged Dennis Allison to write their ain variation of the linguistic communication. How to blueprint and implement a stripped-down version of an interpreter for the BASIC language was covered in articles by Allison in the start 3 quarterly issues of the People's Computer Company newsletter published in 1975 and implementations with source code published in Dr. Dobb's Journal of Tiny Basic Calisthenics & Orthodontia: Running Light Without Overbyte. This led to a wide variety of Tiny Nuts with added features or other improvements, with versions from Tom Pittman and Li-Chen Wang condign especially well known.^[21]

Micro-Soft, by this fourth dimension Microsoft, ported their interpreter for the MOS 6502, which chop-chop become ane of the most pop microprocessors of the 8-chip era. When new microcomputers began to announced, notably the "1977 trinity" of the TRS-lxxx, Commodore PET and Apple II, they either included a version of the MS code, or quickly introduced new models with it. By 1978, MS Basic was a de facto standard and practically every dwelling computer of the 1980s included it in ROM. Upon boot, a BASIC interpreter in directly mode was presented.

Commodore Business concern Machines included Commodore BASIC, based on Microsoft Basic. The Apple II and TRS-80 each had two versions of BASIC, a smaller introductory version introduced with the initial releases of the machines and an MS-based version introduced as interest in the platforms increased. As new companies entered the field, additional versions were added that subtly changed the BASIC family. The Atari 8-bit family had its ain Atari Basic that was modified in order to fit on an viii KB ROM cartridge. Sinclair BASIC was introduced in 1980 with the Sinclair ZX80, and was later extended for the Sinclair ZX81 and the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. The BBC published BBC BASIC, developed by Acorn Computers Ltd, incorporating many extra structured programming keywords and advanced floating-point functioning features.

As the popularity of Bones grew in this period, computer magazines published complete source code in BASIC for video games, utilities, and other programs. Given BASIC'southward straightforward nature, information technology was a unproblematic affair to type in the code from the magazine and execute the program. Different magazines were published featuring programs for specific computers, though some BASIC programs were considered universal and could exist used in machines running any variant of BASIC (sometimes with pocket-sized adaptations). Many books of type-in programs were likewise available, and in particular, Ahl published versions of the original 101 Basic games converted into the Microsoft dialect and published it from Creative Calculating as Bones Computer Games. This book, and its sequels, provided hundreds of prepare-to-go programs that could be easily converted to practically any BASIC-running platform.^{[17] [22] [23]} The book reached the stores in 1978, only equally the abode estimator market was starting off, and it became the first million-selling computer book. Afterwards packages, such as Learn to Program Bones would as well have gaming every bit an introductory focus. On the business-focused CP/M computers which before long became widespread in small business environments, Microsoft BASIC (MBASIC) was one of the leading applications.^[24]

In 1978, David Lien published the start edition of The Basic Handbook: An Encyclopedia of the BASIC Reckoner Language, documenting keywords across over 78 different computers. Past 1981, the 2nd edition documented keywords from over 250 different computers, showcasing the explosive growth of the microcomputer era.^[25]

IBM PC and compatibles [edit]

When IBM was designing the IBM PC they followed the epitome of existing home computers in wanting to have a built-in BASIC. They sourced this from Microsoft – IBM Cassette BASIC – but Microsoft also produced several other versions of Basic for MS-DOS/PC DOS including IBM Disk Basic (Basic D), IBM BASICA (Basic A), GW-Basic (a BASICA-compatible version that did non need IBM'south ROM) and QBasic, all typically bundled with the machine. In addition they produced the Microsoft Bones Compiler aimed at professional programmers. Turbo Pascal-publisher Borland published Turbo Basic i.0 in 1985 (successor versions are nonetheless being marketed by the original author nether the name PowerBASIC). Microsoft wrote the windowed AmigaBASIC that was supplied with version 1.1 of the pre-emptive multitasking GUI Amiga computers (late 1985 / early on 1986), although the production unusually did not bear whatsoever Microsoft marks.

These subsequently variations introduced many extensions, such equally improved string manipulation and graphics support, access to the file arrangement and additional data types. More important were the facilities for structured programming, including additional control structures and proper subroutines supporting local variables. However, by the latter half of the 1980s, users were increasingly using pre-made applications written by others rather than learning programming themselves; while professional person programmers now had a wide range of more advanced languages bachelor on small-scale computers. C and afterwards C++ became the languages of choice for professional "shrink wrap" application development.^{[26] [27]}

Visual Basic [edit]

In 1991, Microsoft introduced Visual Bones, an evolutionary development of QuickBASIC. Information technology included constructs from that language such as block-structured control statements, parameterized subroutines and optional static typing likewise every bit object-oriented constructs from other languages such equally "With" and "For Each". The linguistic communication retained some compatibility with its predecessors, such as the Dim keyword for declarations, "Gosub"/Return statements and optional line numbers which could be used to locate errors. An important commuter for the development of Visual Bones was equally the new macro linguistic communication for Microsoft Excel, a spreadsheet program. To the surprise of many at Microsoft who still initially marketed it equally a language for hobbyists, the language came into widespread use for small custom business applications soon after the release of VB version 3.0, which is widely considered the first relatively stable version.

While many avant-garde programmers still scoffed at its utilise, VB met the needs of small businesses efficiently as by that time, computers running Windows iii.one had become fast enough that many business organisation-related processes could be completed "in the blink of an center" even using a "slow" linguistic communication, as long as large amounts of information were not involved. Many small concern owners found they could create their own small-scale, yet useful applications in a few evenings to meet their own specialized needs. Eventually, during the lengthy lifetime of VB3, knowledge of Visual Bones had become a marketable job skill. Microsoft also produced VBScript in 1996 and Visual Bones .Net in 2001. The latter has essentially the same power every bit C# and Java but with syntax that reflects the original Basic language. The IDE, with its event-driven GUI builder, was also influential on other tools, well-nigh notably Borland Software'due south Delphi for Object Pascal and its own descendants such as Lazarus.^[28]

Mainstream support for the final version 6.0 of the original Visual Basic concluded on March 31, 2005, followed by extended support in March 2008.^[29] On March 11, 2020, Microsoft announced that evolution of the VB.NET linguistic communication had also ended, although it was nevertheless supported.^[thirty] Meanwhile, competitors exist such as Xojo and Gambas.

Mail service-1990 versions and dialects [edit]

Many other Bones dialects take also sprung up since 1990, including the open source QB64 and FreeBASIC, inspired by QBasic, and the Visual Bones-styled RapidQ, Basic For Qt and Gambas. Modern commercial incarnations include PureBasic, PowerBASIC, Xojo, Monkey X and True BASIC (the straight successor to Dartmouth BASIC from a company controlled past Kurtz).

Several web-based simple BASIC interpreters likewise at present be, including Microsoft's Small Basic. Many versions of Basic are also at present available for smartphones and tablets via the Apple App Store, or Google Play store for Android. On game consoles, an awarding for the Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo DSi called Petit Computer allows for programming in a slightly modified version of Bones with DS push back up. A version has also been released for Nintendo Switch.

Calculators [edit]

Variants of Bones are available on graphing and otherwise programmable calculators fabricated by Texas Instruments, HP, Casio, and others.

Windows command-line [edit]

QBasic, a version of Microsoft QuickBASIC without the linker to make EXE files, is nowadays in the Windows NT and DOS-Windows 95 streams of operating systems and can exist obtained for more than recent releases like Windows 7 which do not take them. Prior to DOS 5, the Bones interpreter was GW-Basic. QuickBasic is part of a serial of three languages issued by Microsoft for the dwelling house and office power user and small-scale professional development; QuickC and QuickPascal are the other two. For Windows 95 and 98, which exercise not have QBasic installed by default, they can be copied from the installation disc, which will have a gear up of directories for old and optional software; other missing commands like Exe2Bin and others are in these same directories.

Other [edit]

BASIC came to some video game systems, such equally the Nintendo Famicom.

The various Microsoft, Lotus, and Corel part suites and related products are programmable with Visual Basic in ane form or some other, including LotusScript, which is very similar to VBA 6. The Host Explorer terminal emulator uses WWB as a macro language; or more recently the programme and the suite in which it is contained is programmable in an in-house Bones variant known equally Hummingbird Bones. The VBScript variant is used for programming web content, Outlook 97, Internet Explorer, and the Windows Script Host. WSH besides has a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) engine installed every bit the 3rd of the default engines along with VBScript, JScript, and the numerous proprietary or open source engines which can exist installed similar PerlScript, a couple of Rexx-based engines, Python, Red, Tcl, Delphi, XLNT, PHP, and others; meaning that the two versions of Basic can be used along with the other mentioned languages, every bit well as LotusScript, in a WSF file, through the component object model, and other WSH and VBA constructions. VBScript is i of the languages that can exist accessed by the 4Dos, 4NT, and Take Command enhanced shells. SaxBasic and WWB are also very similar to the Visual Bones line of Basic implementations. The pre-Function 97 macro linguistic communication for Microsoft Discussion is known as WordBASIC. Excel four and five use Visual Bones itself as a macro language. Chipmunk Basic, an old-school interpreter similar to Basics of the 1970s, is available for Linux, Microsoft Windows and macOS.

Legacy [edit]

The ubiquity of BASIC interpreters on personal computers was such that textbooks once included elementary "Endeavour It In Basic" exercises that encouraged students to experiment with mathematical and computational concepts on classroom or habitation computers. Popular computer magazines of the mean solar day typically included type-in programs.

Futurist and sci-fi writer David Brin mourned the loss of ubiquitous Basic in a 2006 Salon article^[31] as have others who first used computers during this era. In plow, the article prompted Microsoft to develop and release Minor Basic;^[32] it also inspired similar projects like Basic-256.^[33] Dartmouth held a 50th anniversary commemoration for Basic on one May 2014,^[34] as did other organisations; at to the lowest degree one arrangement of VBA programmers organised a 35th anniversary observance in 1999.^[35]

Dartmouth Higher historic the 50th anniversary of the Basic language with a day of events^[36] on April xxx, 2014. A short documentary film was produced for the event.^[37]

Syntax [edit]

Typical BASIC keywords [edit]

Information manipulation [edit]

Allow

assigns a value (which may be the result of an expression) to a variable. In nearly dialects of Bones, LET is optional, and a line with no other identifiable keyword volition assume the keyword to be LET.

Data

holds a list of values which are assigned sequentially using the READ command.

READ

reads a value from a DATA statement and assigns it to a variable. An internal pointer keeps track of the terminal Data element that was read and moves it one position frontward with each READ.

RESTORE

resets the internal arrow to the first DATA statement, allowing the program to begin READing from the beginning value. Many dialects allow an optional line number or ordinal value to allow the arrow to be reset to a selected location.

DIM

Sets up an array.

Plan flow command [edit]

IF ... And so ... {ELSE}

used to perform comparisons or brand decisions. Early dialects merely allowed a line number afterwards the THEN, just later versions immune whatever valid statement to follow. ELSE was not widely supported, especially in earlier versions.

FOR ... TO ... {Stride} ... Next

repeat a department of code a given number of times. A variable that acts as a counter, the "index", is bachelor within the loop.

WHILE ... WEND and REPEAT ... UNTIL

repeat a section of code while the specified condition is true. The condition may be evaluated before each iteration of the loop, or after. Both of these commands are found mostly in subsequently dialects.

DO ... LOOP {WHILE} or {UNTIL}

repeat a section of code indefinitely or while/until the specified condition is true. The status may be evaluated before each iteration of the loop, or afterwards. Similar to WHILE, these keywords are mostly constitute in afterwards dialects.

GOTO

jumps to a numbered or labelled line in the program.

GOSUB

jumps to a numbered or labelled line, executes the lawmaking it finds in that location until it reaches a RETURN command, on which it jumps back to the statement following the GOSUB, either after a colon, or on the next line. This is used to implement subroutines.

ON ... GOTO/GOSUB

chooses where to bound based on the specified conditions. See Switch statement for other forms.

DEF FN

a pair of keywords introduced in the early 1960s to define functions. The original BASIC functions were modelled on FORTRAN single-line functions. BASIC functions were one expression with variable arguments, rather than subroutines, with a syntax on the model of DEF FND(10) = ten*10 at the beginning of a program. Part names were originally restricted to FN, plus one letter, i.e., FNA, FNB ...

Input and output [edit]

List

displays the total source code of the current program.

PRINT

displays a message on the screen or other output device.

INPUT

asks the user to enter the value of a variable. The statement may include a prompt bulletin.

TAB

used with PRINT to set the position where the next character will be shown on the screen or printed on paper. AT is an culling grade.

SPC

prints out a number of space characters. Similar in concept to TAB but moves by a number of boosted spaces from the electric current cavalcade rather that moving to a specified column.

Mathematical functions [edit]

ABS

Accented value

ATN

Arctangent (result in radians)

COS

Cosine (argument in radians)

EXP

Exponential function

INT

Integer part (typically floor office)

LOG

Natural logarithm

RND

Random number generation

SIN

Sine (argument in radians)

SQR

Square root

TAN

Tangent (statement in radians)

Miscellaneous [edit]

REM

holds a developer'south comment or REMark; often used to give a championship to the plan and to assistance identify the purpose of a given department of code.

USR

transfers plan control to a machine linguistic communication subroutine, normally entered equally an alphanumeric cord or in a list of Data statements.

CALL

alternative form of USR plant in some dialects. Does non crave an artificial parameter to complete the function-like syntax of USR, and has a clearly divers method of calling different routines in memory.

TRON

turns on brandish of each line number every bit information technology is run ("TRace ON"). This was useful for debugging or correcting of problems in a plan.

TROFF

turns off the display of line numbers.

ASM

some compilers such every bit Freebasic,^[38] Purebasic,^[39] and Powerbasic^[40] too support inline assembly linguistic communication, allowing the programmer to intermix high-level and low-level code, typically prefixed with "ASM" or "!" statements.

Data types and variables [edit]

Minimal versions of Basic had only integer variables and one- or two-alphabetic character variable names, which minimized requirements of limited and expensive memory (RAM). More powerful versions had floating-point arithmetics, and variables could exist labelled with names six or more characters long. There were some bug and restrictions in early implementations; for case, Applesoft Basic allowed variable names to exist several characters long, just merely the first two were significant, thus it was possible to inadvertently write a plan with variables "LOSS" and "LOAN", which would be treated as existence the same; assigning a value to "LOAN" would silently overwrite the value intended as "LOSS". Keywords could not be used in variables in many early BASICs; "SCORE" would exist interpreted as "SC" OR "E", where OR was a keyword. Cord variables are ordinarily distinguished in many microcomputer dialects by having $ suffixed to their proper noun as a sigil, and values are often identified as strings by beingness delimited by "double quotation marks". Arrays in Basic could contain integers, floating indicate or cord variables.

Some dialects of BASIC supported matrices and matrix operations, useful for the solution of sets of simultaneous linear algebraic equations. These dialects would directly support matrix operations such as assignment, add-on, multiplication (of uniform matrix types), and evaluation of a determinant. Many microcomputer Basics did non back up this information type; matrix operations were still possible, just had to be programmed explicitly on array elements.

Examples [edit]

Unstructured BASIC [edit]

New Bones programmers on a domicile computer might start with a uncomplicated program, maybe using the linguistic communication's Impress argument to display a message on the screen; a well-known and often-replicated instance is Kernighan and Ritchie'due south "Hello, World!" plan:

                        ten                                    Print                                    "Hello, World!"            20                                    End          

An infinite loop could exist used to fill the display with the message:

                        10                                    PRINT                                    "Hello, World!"            20                                    GOTO                                    10          

Note that the Finish statement is optional and has no action in most dialects of Bones. It was non ever included, as is the case in this example. This aforementioned program tin be modified to print a fixed number of messages using the common FOR...NEXT argument:

                        10                                    Permit                                    N            =            10            20                                    FOR                                    I            =            1                                    TO                                    Northward            30                                    PRINT                                    "Hello, World!"            40                                    Side by side                                    I          

Most first-generation Basic versions, such every bit MSX BASIC and GW-BASIC, supported unproblematic information types, loop cycles, and arrays. The following example is written for GW-BASIC, but volition work in most versions of BASIC with minimal changes:

                        10                                    INPUT                                    "What is your name: "            ;                                    U$            20                                    PRINT                                    "Hello "            ;                                    U$            30                                    INPUT                                    "How many stars exercise y'all want: "            ;                                    N            40                                    S$                                    =                                    ""            50                                    FOR                                    I                                    =                                    ane                                    TO                                    N            lx                                    S$                                    =                                    S$                                    +                                    "*"            70                                    NEXT                                    I            80                                    Print                                    South$            xc                                    INPUT                                    "Exercise you want more stars? "            ;                                    A$            100                                    IF                                    LEN            (            A$            )                                    =                                    0                                    THEN                                    GOTO                                    xc            110                                    A$                                    =                                    LEFT$            (            A$            ,                                    1            )            120                                    IF                                    A$                                    =                                    "Y"                                    OR                                    A$                                    =                                    "y"                                    THEN                                    GOTO                                    xxx            130                                    Print                                    "Goodbye "            ;                                    U$            140                                    END          

The resulting dialog might resemble:

What is your proper noun: Mike Hello Mike How many stars do you lot want: vii ******* Do y'all want more than stars? yep How many stars practice you want: iii *** Do you want more than stars? no Goodbye Mike        

The original Dartmouth Bones was unusual in having a matrix keyword, MAT.^[f] Although non implemented by most later microprocessor derivatives, it is used in this instance from the 1968 manual^[41] which averages the numbers that are input:

                        five                                    LET                                    S                                    =                                    0            x                                    MAT                                    INPUT                                    Five                                    20                                    LET                                    Northward                                    =                                    NUM                                    30                                    IF                                    N                                    =                                    0                                    And then                                    99                                    40                                    FOR                                    I                                    =                                    1                                    TO                                    North                                    45                                    Permit                                    S                                    =                                    S                                    +                                    V            (            I            )                                    50                                    Next                                    I                                    threescore                                    Impress                                    S            /            N                                    70                                    Become                                    TO                                    5                                    99                                    Finish          

Structured Basic [edit]

Second-generation BASICs (for example, VAX Basic, SuperBASIC, True Bones, QuickBASIC, BBC Bones, Pick BASIC, PowerBASIC, Liberty Bones and (arguably) COMAL) introduced a number of features into the language, primarily related to structured and process-oriented programming. Usually, line numbering is omitted from the language and replaced with labels (for GOTO) and procedures to encourage easier and more flexible design.^[42] In addition keywords and structures to support repetition, selection and procedures with local variables were introduced.

The following example is in Microsoft QuickBASIC:

                        REM QuickBASIC example            REM Forward declaration - allows the main code to call a            REM    subroutine that is divers afterwards in the source code            DECLARE                                    SUB                                    PrintSomeStars                                    (            StarCount!            )            REM Primary programme follows            INPUT                                    "What is your name: "            ,                                    UserName$            Print                                    "Hi "            ;                                    UserName$            Practise                                    INPUT                                    "How many stars exercise you want: "            ,                                    NumStars                                    CALL                                    PrintSomeStars            (            NumStars            )                                    Do                                    INPUT                                    "Do you want more stars? "            ,                                    Answer$                                    LOOP                                    UNTIL                                    Answer$                                    <>                                    ""                                    Respond$                                    =                                    LEFT$            (            Answer$            ,                                    1            )            LOOP                                    WHILE                                    UCASE$            (            Answer$            )                                    =                                    "Y"            PRINT                                    "Goodbye "            ;                                    UserName$            END            REM subroutine definition            SUB                                    PrintSomeStars                                    (            StarCount            )                                    REM                                    This                                    procedure                                    uses                                    a                                    local                                    variable                                    called                                    Stars$                                    Stars$                                    =                                    String$            (            StarCount            ,                                    "*"            )                                    PRINT                                    Stars$            Finish                                    SUB          

Object-oriented Bones [edit]

3rd-generation Bones dialects such as Visual Basic, Xojo, Gambas, StarOffice Bones, BlitzMax and PureBasic introduced features to support object-oriented and event-driven programming paradigm. Most congenital-in procedures and functions are now represented every bit methods of standard objects rather than operators. As well, the operating system became increasingly accessible to the Basic language.

The post-obit example is in Visual Bones .NET:

                        Public            Module            StarsProgram            Individual            Office            Ask            (            prompt            Equally            Cord            )            As            String            Console            .            Write            (            prompt            )            Render            Console            .            ReadLine            ()            Finish            Part            Public            Sub            Primary            ()            Dim            userName            =            Ask            (            "What is your proper noun: "            )            Console            .            WriteLine            (            "Hello {0}"            ,            userName            )            Dim            answer            As            String            Practise            Dim            numStars            =            CInt            (            Ask            (            "How many stars practice yous want: "            ))            Dim            stars            Equally            New            Cord            (            "*"c            ,            numStars            )            Console            .            WriteLine            (            stars            )            Practise            answer            =            Inquire            (            "Exercise y'all want more than stars? "            )            Loop            Until            answer            <>            ""            Loop            While            reply            .            StartsWith            (            "Y"            ,            StringComparison            .            OrdinalIgnoreCase            )            Console            .            WriteLine            (            "Goodbye {0}"            ,            userName            )            Finish            Sub            End            Module          

Standards [edit]

• ANSI/ISO/IEC Standard for Minimal Basic:
  • ANSI X3.60-1978 "For minimal Basic"
  • ISO/IEC 6373:1984 "Data Processing—Programming Languages—Minimal BASIC"
• ECMA-55 Minimal BASIC (withdrawn, like to ANSI X3.60-1978)
• ANSI/ISO/IEC Standard for Full Basic:
  • ANSI X3.113-1987 "Programming Languages Full Basic"
  • INCITS/ISO/IEC 10279-1991 (R2005) "Information Applied science – Programming Languages – Full BASIC"
• ANSI/ISO/IEC Addendum Defining Modules:
  • ANSI X3.113 Interpretations-1992 "BASIC Technical Information Message # 1 Interpretations of ANSI 03.113-1987"
  • ISO/IEC 10279:1991/ Amd i:1994 "Modules and Single Character Input Enhancement"
• ECMA-116 BASIC (withdrawn, similar to ANSI X3.113-1987)

Compilers and interpreters [edit]

Run into also [edit]

• List of Basic dialects

Notes [edit]

1. ^ Fortran's DO had a keep for this purpose, but notwithstanding required the line number to exist entered.
2. ^ Tymshare charged about $10 per hr (equivalent to $67 in 2020) for accessing their systems.
3. ^ Widely regarded as the offset "true" mini, the PDP-eight'southward 12-bit memory infinite allowed 4,096 address of 12-$.25 each, or 6,144 bytes.
4. ^ Interpreters are ultimately similar to compilers in the tasks they perform, converting source code to machine code, but differ in when they perform it. Compilers catechumen the entire plan at in one case and output a separate runnable program. Interpreters more often than not convert only a single line at a time (or even just a portion of it) and so immediately release that code once the line has completed running. This means they require merely enough memory to run a unmarried line, and do not require some form of high-functioning secondary memory like a difficult drive.
5. ^ Microsoft Basic left 780 bytes free for user program code and variable values on a 4K auto, and that was running a cutting-down version lacking string variables and other functionality.
6. ^ From version three onwards.

References [edit]

1. ^ Ring Squad (October 23, 2021). "The Ring programming language and other languages". ring-lang.net.
2. ^ Kemeny, John G.; Kurtz, Thomas E. (1964). Bones: a manual for BASIC, the elementary algebraic language designed for employ with the Dartmouth Time Sharing System (PDF) (1st ed.). Hanover, Northward.H.: Dartmouth Higher Computation Center.
3. ^ "Loftier Math at Hanover". Time. February 23, 1959.
4. ^ ^{a b c d due east f} Fourth dimension 2014.
5. ^ Rankin, Joy Lisi (2018), A People'due south History of Computing in the United States, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard Academy Press, ISBN9780674970977 , p. 23
6. ^ "BASIC". Jargon File . Retrieved June 13, 2017.
7. ^ "Thomas E. Kurtz – History of Computer Programming Languages". cis-alumni.org . Retrieved June 13, 2017.
8. ^ Alfred, Randy (January 5, 2008). "May 1, 1964: Beginning Basic Programme Runs". Wired . Retrieved June 13, 2017.
9. ^ Brooks, David (11 June 2019). "Finally, a historical marker that talks nigh something important". Concord Monitor. Archived from the original on eleven June 2019. Retrieved 11 Baronial 2019.
10. ^ Bauer, W. F., Computer pattern from the programmer'southward viewpoint Archived July 23, 2016, at the Wayback Machine (Eastern Joint Estimator Briefing, December 1958) 1 of the first descriptions of computer time-sharing.
11. ^ "IBM VS the World: That's How Information technology Is". Computerworld. December v, 1973.
12. ^ Bourne, Charles; Hahn, Trudi Bellardo (August 2003). A History of Online Information Services, 1963–1976. p. 387. ISBN9780262261753.
13. ^ "2000 Timeshare System".
14. ^ "Passing the 10-year marking". Measure out Magazine. Hewlett Packard. October 1976.
15. ^ Marks, Shirley (December 1971). The JOSS Years: Reflections on an experiment (PDF) (Technical report). Rand.
16. ^ Savetz, Kevin (April 2013). "Dave Ahl and Betsy Ah" (Interview).
17. ^ ^{a b} Ahl, David H. (1973). 101 Basic estimator games. Morristown, Due north.J.: Creative Computing Press. OCLC 896774158.
18. ^ Ahl, David H. (May eleven, 1981). "Reckoner Games". InfoWorld. Vol. 3, no. 9. p. 44. ISSN 0199-6649.
19. ^ Dijkstra, Edsger W. (June 18, 1975). "How do we tell truths that might hurt" (PDF). Selected Writings on Computing: A Personal Perspective. Springer-Verlag (published 1982). pp. 129–131. ISBN978-0387906522. OCLC 693424350.
20. ^ "We take a BASIC". New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science. Archived from the original on November 30, 2012. Retrieved April 18, 2007.
21. ^ Pittman, Tom. "you had to pay $5 upward forepart to get it…". world wide web.ittybittycomputers.com . Retrieved June 14, 2017.
22. ^ Ahl, David H. (1979). More basic figurer games. Morristown: Creative Computing Press. ISBN978-0894801372. OCLC 839377789.
23. ^ Ahl, David H. (1984). Big figurer games. Morris Plains, Due north.J.: Creative Computing Printing. ISBN978-0916688400. OCLC 872675092.
24. ^ "Osborne 1". oldcomputers.net . Retrieved June 14, 2017.
25. ^ Lien, David (1981). The BASIC Handbook (Second ed.). San Diego, CA: Compusoft Publishing. p. inside encompass. ISBN0-932760-00-vii.
26. ^ Pravin, Jain (2011). The Class Of Java. Pearson Pedagogy India. ISBN9788131755440.
27. ^ "GNE: the C programming linguistic communication". fysh.org . Retrieved June xiv, 2017. During the 1980s, C compilers spread widely, and C became an extremely pop language.
28. ^ "25 years of Delphi and no Oracle in sight: Not a Visual Basic killer but hard to impale".
29. ^ "Product Family unit Life Bicycle Guidelines for Visual Basic 6.0". Msdn2.microsoft.com. March 31, 2005. Retrieved June 16, 2009.
30. ^ "Visual Basic support planned for .Cyberspace v.0". March 11, 2020.
31. ^ Brin, David (September 14, 2006). "Why Johnny Tin't Code". Salon. Archived from the original on September 18, 2013. Retrieved June 19, 2017.
32. ^ "Small Basic". Microsoft Developer Network. Archived from the original on March 17, 2014. Retrieved June 19, 2017.
33. ^ "BASIC-256 homepage".
34. ^ "Dartmouth plans commemoration for 50th anniversary of Bones computer language". New Hampshire Union Leader. April 28, 2014. Retrieved June 14, 2017.
35. ^ "50th anniversary of Bones – Google Search". Google.
36. ^ "Basic at fifty – Event Schedule". Dartmouth Higher. Retrieved June 14, 2017.
37. ^ "BASIC at 50". Dartmouth College. Retrieved June 14, 2017.
38. ^ "KeyPgAsm". FreeBasic Wiki . Retrieved August two, 2017.
39. ^ "Inline x86 ASM". Pure Basic . Retrieved August ii, 2017.
40. ^ "Using assembly-language in your code". Power Basic. Archived from the original on August two, 2017. Retrieved Baronial 2, 2017.
41. ^ Kemeny, John Grand.; Kurtz, Thomas E. (January 1968). Basic: a manual for BASIC, the elementary algebraic language designed for use with the Dartmouth Time Sharing System (PDF) (fourth ed.). Hanover, North.H.: Dartmouth College Computation Center. p. 53.
42. ^ "Differences Between GW-Basic and QBasic". May 12, 2003. Archived from the original on October 19, 2013. Retrieved June 28, 2008.

General references [edit]

• Sammet, Jean E. (1969). Programming languages: history and fundamentals. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall. OCLC 819683527.
• Kurtz, Thomas E. (1981). "Basic". In Wexelblat, Richard (ed.). History of programming languages. History of Programming Languages I. New York: ACM. pp. 515–537. doi:x.1145/800025.1198404. ISBN978-0127450407.
• Kemeny, John G.; Kurtz, Thomas Due east. (1985). Back To BASIC: The History, Corruption, and Future of the Linguistic communication. Addison-Wesley. p. 141. ISBN9780201134339. OCLC 11399298.
• Lien, David A. (1986). The Basic Handbook: Encyclopedia of the Basic Reckoner Language (tertiary ed.). Compusoft Publishing. ISBN9780932760333. OCLC 12548310.
• "L Years of BASIC, the Programming Language That Made Computers Personal". Fourth dimension. Apr 29, 2014.

External links [edit]

• Basic at Curlie
• "Basic—Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code". The Encyclopedia of Computer Languages. Murdoch University.
• The Birth of Bones on YouTube

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BASIC

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