What is basic?

What is BASIC?

BASIC (Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a high-level programming language developed by John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz at Dartmouth College in the mid-1960s. BASIC gained its enormous popularity due to the fact that BASIC was unbelievably easy to program, and that Microsoft and many other software development companies endorsed the use of BASIC. In the past there have been several different variants of BASIC for the x86 architecture such as, Tiny BASIC and Microsoft BASIC, which made BASIC the first lingua franca of microcomputers. Other important implementations have been CBASIC (Compiled BASIC), Integer and GW-BASIC (for the IBM PC), Turbo BASIC (from Borland), and Microsoft QuickBasic. The original language has changed over the years. Early versions were unstructured and interpreted. Later versions had a certain degree of structure added and were often compiled. BASIC is often taught to beginner programmers because it is extremely easy to use and understand and because it contains the same major concepts as many other languages thought to be more difficult, such as Pascal and C. However, it is rumored that programming in BASIC causes brain damage and should be avoided at all cost. Despite this rumor there is a version of BASIC for most modern operating systems such as PIOS.

AG00282_.GIF (2198 bytes)

piesoftwareinc@piesoftwareinc.co.uk

Return To Homepage

PIE Software Inc. 09/07/2001