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BASIC computer language turns 40
The Salt Lake Tribune ^ | April 30, 2004 | J.M. Hirsch The Associated Press

Posted on 05/01/2004 10:22:14 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach

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To: JenB
Happy Birthday!
21 posted on 05/01/2004 11:04:34 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach (The terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States - and war is what they got!!!!)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Paul Vick, a senior developer at Microsoft, said his company owes much to BASIC>>>

Yes, starting with most Windows source code.
22 posted on 05/01/2004 11:04:51 AM PDT by Ronly Bonly Jones
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To: pt17
I feel old cause I am, takes me a couple of hours in the morning to get going. I taught math in the early 60's as a grad teaching assistant working on advanced degrees.
23 posted on 05/01/2004 11:06:40 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach (The terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States - and war is what they got!!!!)
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To: pt17
The Osborn was the early '80s. The Commadore 64 was intorduced in 1986 (I think).


24 posted on 05/01/2004 11:08:04 AM PDT by South40 (Amnesty for ILLEGALS is a slap in the face to the USBP!)
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To: Moose4
lol!
25 posted on 05/01/2004 11:11:21 AM PDT by Texas_Jarhead
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Great memories, in fact. Prior to there being significant inexpensive software to license for a home computer I wrote a check book balancing program in BASICA. My wife played with it a bit and that helped her later as she wrote SAS programs in grad school. I never had to use it on the job though. Maybe that's why my memories are fond.
26 posted on 05/01/2004 11:11:55 AM PDT by jimfree (Oblivious is as oblivious does.)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Memories !!

Gee, I didn't realize that BASIC was THAT old.
My introduction to programming languages began in '71 with keypunching FORTRAN IV (w/ WATFOR AND WATFIV), COBOL and IBM 370 Assembly Language. I didn't stumble across BASIC until '75 or '76, and remember thinking it was nothing but an anemic (albeit easier), watered down version of FORTRAN.

27 posted on 05/01/2004 11:13:21 AM PDT by Willie Green (Go Pat Go!!!)
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To: saquin
I remember writing programs in BASIC on my old Commodore Vic 20 (hooked up to a 12-inch black and white TV, and a tape recorder to save programs

A buddy of mine was taking a programming class in the early 80s. He used to bring over the audio cassettes and we'd play them on the stereo. wEiRd sOuNdS! <|:)~

28 posted on 05/01/2004 11:13:48 AM PDT by martin_fierro (A v v n c v l v s M a x i m v s)
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To: Ronly Bonly Jones
Yes, starting with most Windows source code.

Oh really?!? Windows is written in BASIC?

29 posted on 05/01/2004 11:13:51 AM PDT by mikegi
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To: Rebelbase
I still have my first "laptop" sitting on my bookshelf. A Timex Sinclair 2068. Of course you needed a TV set for the monitor and a cassette player for memory. Still it was sort of portable.....
30 posted on 05/01/2004 11:19:47 AM PDT by fjsva
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To: fjsva
I still have my first "laptop" sitting on my bookshelf. A Timex Sinclair 2068. Of course you needed a TV set for the monitor and a cassette player for memory. Still it was sort of portable.....

Well, all together that would weigh about as much as one of the original Compaq "luggables". After I'd haul one of those things around airports all day I'd swear one arm was an inch longer than the other.

31 posted on 05/01/2004 11:22:29 AM PDT by mikegi
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To: mikegi
It would explain much. If true. ;0)
32 posted on 05/01/2004 11:23:12 AM PDT by Ronly Bonly Jones
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To: South40
I have one of those!!!!! It still works too.

If only I could remember all those Commode r commands.
33 posted on 05/01/2004 11:25:48 AM PDT by Conan the Librarian (I am a Librarian. I don't know anything....I just know where to look it up.)
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To: JenB
This is cool! I share a birthday with a really ancient programming language!

That is cool! And what's even cooler is it's one of the few programming languages I actually know! I have some old D&D rpg games written in BASIC lying around here somewhere, was thinking of typing them in to play them a while back :)

34 posted on 05/01/2004 11:27:05 AM PDT by Fedora
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To: Conan the Librarian
If only I could remember all those Commode r commands.

Check this

35 posted on 05/01/2004 11:36:38 AM PDT by South40 (Amnesty for ILLEGALS is a slap in the face to the USBP!)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
I'm afraid we dinosaurs will be extincted soon. Kids today don't know or appreciate real programming. Interview one and ask: "What programming languages do you know?" If you get the answer "All of them", you've found your candidate. Programming is an art. Just because someone takes a VB class in school and can operate any one of our great point and click 4GL development environments (Visual C++, Delphi, etc.) doesn't make him a programmer. Let's talk technical. (from an old Digital perspective).

I don't have anyone to talk dirty with anymore. boo hoo.

36 posted on 05/01/2004 11:37:52 AM PDT by kdot
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Makes me feel old having my first computer experience writing programs in a BASIC predecessor, FORTRAN, entering my programs and data on punch cards
37 posted on 05/01/2004 11:42:43 AM PDT by The Great RJ
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
The original version of BASIC may have been designed 40 years ago, but how many people (even among those who program some variant of BASIC) know Dartmouth BASIC?

When did the first variants appear that regarded strings as a natural type (rather than an array) and allowed for multiple statements on a line (including following an IF/THEN)?

On a related note, did Darmouth basic start out supporting the "MAT" keyword, or was that a later enhancement?

38 posted on 05/01/2004 11:47:48 AM PDT by supercat (Why is it that the more "gun safety" laws are passed, the less safe my guns seem?)
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To: pt17
LOL, the paper tape on an ASR was a little tougher to fix than a punch card. On the other hand, dropping a roll of paper tape wasn't nearly as bad as dropping a tray of cards, was it?

I remember pulling an all-nighter at the computer center when some poor guy dropped a shoebox full of punch cards. They scattered everywhere. The guy was almost in tears and the rest of us truly felt his pain.

39 posted on 05/01/2004 11:52:04 AM PDT by jalisco555 ("The right to bear weapons is the right to be free" - A. E. Van Vogt)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Memories !!

I was a late-comer. Didn't start using BASIC until 1970 on a college computer. A couple years later I really appreciated the simplicity of BASIC when I started doing Octal machine language programming on a PDP-8. One thing that sucked was saving your code on paper tape rolls and tieing it with a rubber band. Still got a few rolls laying around here. Then when I got my Apple-II in '77 I was amazed at the expanded repertoir of BASIC commands over that of the college system that cost 100 times as much.

40 posted on 05/01/2004 11:55:07 AM PDT by roadcat
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