11–20 of 35 posts
For me, those were the days to start learning Turbo Pascal, and QBasic was used mainly to run nibbles and gorillas, when I got bored of a coding session.
Shout-out to QB64 - An attempt at a modern version/compiler for QBasic code, as well as updated features. I used to do a fair amount of programming in QB64, and the design of the language hampers it as a general-purpose language, it's a fun language for learning and writing in.
Still, bundling a quite capable IDE with an OS was a very nice practice, but it basically ended then, probably because MS also sold Visual Basic. Without QBasic I wouldn't have started programming at all - I wonder how it would be if I was starting right now. Is there any ubiquitous, simple language available basically everywhere and with a nice IDE by default? JavaScript almost fits the bill, but as a beginner who doesn't know any better you're likely to use Notepad, while with QBasic you had a real IDE from the beginning.
Having started with ZX Spectrum BASIC (Timex 2068), followed by hexdumps, and moving into GW-Basic/Turbo Basic and Assembly after getting my first PC, I never coding anything meaningful in QBasic. For me, those were the days to start learning Turbo Pascal, and QBasic was used mainly to run nibbles and gorillas, when I got bored of a coding session.
When I got a computer good enough to run QBasic (or anything newer than DOS 3.3), it could compile C as well (with DJGPP) so I completely skipped QBasic.
I managed to dig up one of my old 3d demo projects: Source: https://gist.github.com/dhotson/686036fb771fbbca8c48 Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/4fpaYtO.png .. it's not as embarrassing as I expected. :)
This is fantastic. My first game was in GW-BASIC, but I quickly upgraded once I discovered QBasic on DOS 6.22. I also loved the MS-DOS Shell ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOS_Shell ) found on the supplemental disk of v6.22. It felt like multitasking...but wasn't.
Having started with ZX Spectrum BASIC (Timex 2068), followed by hexdumps, and moving into GW-Basic/Turbo Basic and Assembly after getting my first PC, I never coding anything meaningful in QBasic. For me, those were the days to start learning Turbo Pascal, and QBasic was used mainly to run nibbles and gorillas, when I got bored of a coding session.
Thanks for reminding me about Gorillas. For anyone unfamiliar with it, it's basically Artillery with bananas :-)
IIRC the version bundled with DOS6.22 was severly limited: it couldn't generate executables and the built-in help was only for IDE, without help on the language at all. That's because MS was also selling QBasic "pro" version. It was basically impossible to buy any software then in my country, so I was stuck with normal QBasic for a few years, until I got Internet connection and pirated a full version (it was still im…
There's also NetBeans, KDevelop, Komodo, Virtual Studio Express, Xojo, and more. It depends what you want to do.
And if you're on a Mac, I'd go with Xcode+Swift. Great language for beginners.
IIRC the version bundled with DOS6.22 was severly limited: it couldn't generate executables and the built-in help was only for IDE, without help on the language at all. That's because MS was also selling QBasic "pro" version. It was basically impossible to buy any software then in my country, so I was stuck with normal QBasic for a few years, until I got Internet connection and pirated a full version (it was still im…