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BASIC was not just a programming language

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Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#11

Post by rahimnathwani »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #10
tromp wrote: post #6

> If you ran out of numbers, the renum command would recompute all the line numbers for you. This is the first time I heard of such a BASIC command, even though I grew up learning to program on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. Which of the home computers of the time had this command? Would it renumber in multiples of 10?

Amstrad CPC (Locomotive BASIC) and the BBC Micro both had it. In the CPC implementation, at least, you could choose the starting line number and the increment, e.g. RENUM 100,5

IIRC BBC BASIC let you choose the renumber increment, but the ZX Spectrum didn't.

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#12

Post by CJefferson »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #3
mcbishop wrote: post #2

> The Amstrad CPC 646 would literally take less than a second to boot Wow.

Everything was in ROM: 16k BASIC, 16k operating system, optional 16k disk operating system. The 464 (“646” is a typo) shipped with a cassette deck, not a floppy disk drive, so there was no possibility of loading the OS from volatile storage.

They could have typoed '664', which was the 464 with a floppy disk drive. However there basic was still in the ROM.

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#13

Post by nox100 »

zubairq wrote: post #4

I agree that dropping into the basic interpreter was amazing on the old 8 bit computers. Things have really changed recently with the popularity of Retro computing as I wrote about the exact same thing around 10-15 years ago (I can't find the post unfortunately) and I was downvoted a lot as almost all the commenters seemed to think that accessing DevTools in Google Chrome and entering Javascript commands was that sam…

I grew up typing programs from softdisk magazine, Compute! etc... into TRS-80, Apple II, Atari 800, and C-64. I still think JavaScript in a browser is better.

JavaScript is way more powerful than Basic on any of those 4 platforms. The canvas 2D API is way more capable and easy than what came with those systems. Even getting something like
Was 50-150 lines of code in BASIC, by which I mean a text input line with a cursor and editing and not just BASIC's "INPUT" command which provided nearly zero editing support.

Libraries like pixi.js or three.js or p5.js etc make it trivial to get fancy graphics on the screen. Making something you can share it with your friends or the entire world with a link, even if they don't own the same type of machine running the same OS. Host them on codepen, jsfiddle, github pages, all free.

I loved my experience with Basic and those old machines but I wouldn't force my kids to learn that way.

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#14

Post by [deleted] »

tromp wrote: post #6

> If you ran out of numbers, the renum command would recompute all the line numbers for you. This is the first time I heard of such a BASIC command, even though I grew up learning to program on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. Which of the home computers of the time had this command? Would it renumber in multiples of 10?

[deleted]

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#15

Post by nox100 »

tromp wrote: post #6

> If you ran out of numbers, the renum command would recompute all the line numbers for you. This is the first time I heard of such a BASIC command, even though I grew up learning to program on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. Which of the home computers of the time had this command? Would it renumber in multiples of 10?

Don't know which ones did. TRS-80, C-64, VIC-20, Atari 800, Apple II, did NOT

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#16

Post by Doctor_Fegg »

CJefferson wrote: post #12
Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything was in ROM: 16k BASIC, 16k operating system, optional 16k disk operating system. The 464 (“646” is a typo) shipped with a cassette deck, not a floppy disk drive, so there was no possibility of loading the OS from volatile storage.

They could have typoed '664', which was the 464 with a floppy disk drive. However there basic was still in the ROM.

Indeed. I still have my 664 in the loft somewhere!

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#18

Post by bestouff »

nox100 wrote: post #13
zubairq wrote: post #4

I agree that dropping into the basic interpreter was amazing on the old 8 bit computers. Things have really changed recently with the popularity of Retro computing as I wrote about the exact same thing around 10-15 years ago (I can't find the post unfortunately) and I was downvoted a lot as almost all the commenters seemed to think that accessing DevTools in Google Chrome and entering Javascript commands was that sam…

I grew up typing programs from softdisk magazine, Compute! etc... into TRS-80, Apple II, Atari 800, and C-64. I still think JavaScript in a browser is better. JavaScript is way more powerful than Basic on any of those 4 platforms. The canvas 2D API is way more capable and easy than what came with those systems. Even getting something like Was 50-150 lines of code in BASIC, by which I mean a text input line with a cur…

Except it's way less discoverable. The BASIC prompt was all you got on some 8 bits computers, so it made playing with it almost mandatory. Also everything was way simpler (less abstractions layers, no network) to grok for a young kid.

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#19

Post by eterps »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #10
tromp wrote: post #6

> If you ran out of numbers, the renum command would recompute all the line numbers for you. This is the first time I heard of such a BASIC command, even though I grew up learning to program on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. Which of the home computers of the time had this command? Would it renumber in multiples of 10?

Amstrad CPC (Locomotive BASIC) and the BBC Micro both had it. In the CPC implementation, at least, you could choose the starting line number and the increment, e.g. RENUM 100,5

MSX supported that as well

Re: BASIC was not just a programming language

#20

Post by fuzzfactor »

mcbishop wrote: post #2

> The Amstrad CPC 646 would literally take less than a second to boot Wow.

>literally take less than a second to boot

Literally, completely wrong.

More like less than a second after power-up to reach full usefulness at the command line.

These type computers did not need to actually boot their OS from a "peripheral" storage device.

They did not "boot" at all, they just ran the built-in OS/BASIC straight from where it was contained on ROM.

This was like the C64 which had its BASIC in internal ROM too.

With the early Atari's the internal ROM was more like a skeletal BIOS which ran whichever ROM cartridge you had in the game slot, whether it was a commercial game or not. And the Atari BASIC command line was only available if you had the BASIC cartridge inserted where a game would otherwise be.

RAM and storage were almost all yours.

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