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Wilmington, North Carolina once had a thriving Black middle class and an elected interracial government. In 1898 white supremacists used violence to overthrow that government, kill Black residents and drive many others from the city.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
| Microsoft BASIC | |
|---|---|
| Designed by | Microsoft |
| Developer | Microsoft |
| First appeared | 1975 (cf. Altair BASIC) |
| Stable release | cf. Visual Basic .NET
/ 2018 |
Microsoft BASIC is the foundation software product of the Microsoft company and evolved into a line of BASIC interpreters and compiler(s) adapted for many different microcomputers. It first appeared in 1975 as Altair BASIC, which was the first version of BASIC published by Microsoft as well as the first high-level programming language available for the Altair 8800 microcomputer.
During the home computer craze of the late-1970s and early-1980s, Microsoft BASIC was ported to and supplied with many home computer designs. Slight variations to add support for machine-specific functions, especially graphics, led to a profusion of related designs like Commodore BASIC and Atari Microsoft BASIC.
As the early home computers gave way to newer designs like the IBM Personal Computer and Macintosh, BASIC was no longer as widely used, although it retained a strong following. The release of Visual Basic rebooted its popularity and it remains in wide use on Microsoft Windows platforms in its most recent incarnation, Visual Basic .NET.
The Altair BASIC interpreter was developed by Microsoft founders Paul Allen and Bill Gates using a self-written Intel 8080 emulator running on a PDP-10 minicomputer.[1] The MS dialect is patterned on Digital Equipment Corporation's BASIC-PLUS on the PDP-10, which Gates had used in high school.[2] The first versions supported integer math only, but Monte Davidoff convinced them that floating-point arithmetic was possible, and wrote a library which became the Microsoft Binary Format.
In the Microsoft BASIC family of 8-bit interpreters (Altair BASIC, TRS-80 BASIC, etc), features and commands inspired by DEC's PDP-10 BASIC-PLUS include: the single byte tokens for keywords, % for integers, $ for strings, 4-byte floating points Microsoft Binary Format, : statement separator, # for file handles, random file access (FIELD, GET, PUT, LSET, RSET), and more. Microsoft's BASIC builtin line editor, the EDIT command, was inspired by the TOPS-10 EDIT text editor's Alter subcommand.[1]
Altair BASIC was delivered on paper tape and in its original version took 4 KB of memory. The following functions and statements were available:
LIST, NEW, PRINT, INPUT, IF...THEN, FOR...NEXT, SQR, RND, SIN, LET, USR, DATA, READ, REM, CLEAR, STOP, TAB, RESTORE, ABS, END, INT, RETURN, STEP, GOTO, and GOSUB.
There were no string variables in 4K BASIC and single-precision 32-bit floating point was the only numeric type supported. Variable names consisted of one letter (A–Z) or one letter followed by one digit (0–9), thus allowing up to 286 numeric variables.
For machines with more memory, the 8 KB version added 31 additional statements and support for string variables and their related operations like MID$ and string concatenation. String variables were denoted with a $ suffix, which remained in later versions of the language. Later on, Microsoft released the 12K Extended BASIC, which included double precision 64-bit variables, IF…THEN…ELSE structures, user defined functions, more advanced program editing commands, and descriptive error messages as opposed to error numbers. Numeric variables now had three basic types, % denoted 16-bit integers, # denoted 64-bit doubles, and ! denoted 32-bit singles, but this was the default format so the ! is rarely seen in programs.
The extended 8 KB version was then generalized into BASIC-80 (8080/85, Z80), and ported into BASIC-68 (6800), BASIC-69 (6809), and 6502-BASIC. The 6502 had somewhat less dense assembler code and expanded in size to just under 8K for the single precision version, or 9K for a version using an intermediate 40-bit floating point format in place of the original 32-bit version. This new 40-bit format became the most common as it was used on most 6502-based machines of the era. It was also ported to the 16-bit BASIC-86 (8086/88).
The final major release of BASIC-80 was version 5.x, which appeared in 1981 and added support for 40-character variable names, WHILE…WEND loops, dynamic string allocation, and several other features. BASIC 5.x removed the ability to crunch program lines.
The core command set and syntax are the same in all implementations of Microsoft BASIC and, generally speaking, a program can be run on any version if it does not use hardware-specific features or double precision numbers (not supported in some implementations).
After the initial success of Altair BASIC, Microsoft BASIC became the basis for a lucrative software licensing business, being ported to numerous home and other personal computers of the 1970s and especially the 1980s, and extended along the way. Contrary to the original Altair BASIC, most home computer BASICs are resident in ROM, and are available on the machines at power-on in the form of the characteristic "READY". prompt. This contributed to Microsoft's and other variants of BASIC becoming a commonplace part of the user interface of many home computers' rudimentary operating systems.
Microsoft used its DECsystem-20 to produce assembly code for dozens of different computer systems and CPUs from the same source code, using conditional compilation.[3] By 1981, Microsoft BASIC was so popular that even companies that already had a BASIC licensed the language, such as IBM for its Personal Computer,[4] and Atari, which sold both Atari Microsoft BASIC and its own Atari BASIC.[5] IBM's Don Estridge said, "Microsoft BASIC had hundreds of thousands of users around the world. How are you going to argue with that?"[4] Microsoft licensed similar versions to companies that competed with each other. After licensing IBM Advanced BASIC (BASICA) to IBM, for example, Microsoft licensed the compatible GW-BASIC to makers of PC clones, and sold copies to retail customers.[6] The company similarly licensed an Applesoft-compatible BASIC to VTech for its Laser 128 clone.[7]
Known variants:
MBASIC is available for CP/M-80 and ISIS-II. Also available for TEKDOS.
MBASIC is a stripped-down BASIC-80 with only hardware-neutral functions. However, due to the popularity of CP/M, the great majority of Z80 machines ran MBASIC, rather than a version customized for specific hardware (TRS-80 BASIC was one of the few exceptions). Microsoft's CP/M card for the Apple II included a modified version of MBASIC that incorporated some of the graphics commands from Applesoft BASIC, such as HPLOT, but the full command set is not supported.
The first implementation to use an 8-bit variant of the File Allocation Table (FAT) was a BASIC adaptation[nb 1] for an Intel 8080-based NCR 7200,[nb 1] 7520,[nb 1] or 7530[nb 1] data-entry terminal with 8-inch floppy disks in 1977/1978.
Microsoft offered a BASIC compiler for BASIC-80 under CP/M, by 1980 or before. The compiler executable was named BASCOM or BASCOM32.[9]
The TRS-80 computer was offered initially with an adaption of Li-Chen Wang's Tiny BASIC (Level I BASIC); within a few months this was replaced by a port of BASIC-80 which incorporated some of Level I BASIC's command set, particularly the commands for setting graphics characters. Level II BASIC contained some of the features of Extended BASIC, although due to the need to include Level I commands such as SET and PSET, other features such as descriptive error messages still had to be left out; these were subsequently added into TRS-80 Disk BASIC.
The TRS-80 Model 4 had a newer disk-based BASIC that used the BASIC-80 5.x core, which included support for 40-character variable names. Thus the ability to crunch program lines (without spaces between keywords and arguments) was no longer possible as it had been in Level II. It was no longer necessary to reserve string space. New features included user defined functions (DEF FN) and access to TRSDOS 6 system functions via a SYSTEM keyword. A modified version published later by OS provider Logical Systems, in the LS-DOS Version 6.3 update, added single-letter access to BASIC control functions (like LIST and EDIT) and direct access to LS-DOS supervisor calls. The program edit environment was still line-oriented. The facility available in Level II to sort arrays (CMD"O") was not available; programmers and users had to devise their own workarounds.
The first implementation as a standalone disk-based language system was for Seattle Computer Products S-100 bus 8086 CPU card in 1979. It was using an 8-bit FAT file system.
Microsoft also offered a version of Standalone BASIC-86 for SBC-86/12 for Intel's 8086 Single Board Computer platform in 1980.
Microsoft ported BASIC-80 to the 6502 during the summer of 1976; it was mostly a straight port of the 8K version of BASIC-80 and included the same prompts asking for memory size and if the user wanted floating point functions enabled or not (having them active used an extra 135 bytes of memory). The earliest machines to use 6502 BASIC were the Ohio Scientific Model 500 and KIM-1 in 1977.[10] 6502 BASIC included certain features from Extended BASIC such as user-defined functions and descriptive error messages, but omitted other features like double precision variables and the PRINT USING statement. As compensation for not having double precision variables, Microsoft included 40-bit floating point support instead of BASIC-80's 32-bit floating point and string allocation was dynamic (thus the user did not have to reserve string space like in BASIC-80). However, vendors could still request BASIC with 32-bit floating point for a slightly smaller memory footprint; as one example, Disk BASIC for the Atari 8-bits used 32-bit floating point rather than 40-bit.[citation needed]
Standard features of the 9K version of Microsoft 6502 BASIC included:
GET statement to detect a key press.6502 BASIC lacked a standardized set of commands for disk and printer output; these were up to the vendor to add and varied widely with each implementation.
Later implementations of 6502 BASIC (1983–) had many vendor specific improvements; for example later versions of Commodore BASIC had the following:
DIRECTORY, DSAVE, DLOAD, BACKUP, HEADER, SCRATCH, COLLECT, DVERIFY, COPY, DELETE, RENAME, etc.)CIRCLE, DRAW, BOX, COLOR (of background, border, etc.), PAINT, SCALE)SSHAPE and GSHAPE with OR, AND, XOR, etc.)VOL, SOUND), later on at C=128 Music commands (ADSR and SID filter programming (ENVELOPE and FILTER), PLAY, TEMPO commands)IF–THEN–ELSE, DO–LOOP–WHILE/UNTIL–EXIT.JOY, function keysSTOP, CONT, TRON, TROFF, RESUMEWINDOWRENUMBER, NEW, MONITOR, RREGMicrosoft catalogs from the 1980s also showed the availability of BASIC-68 and BASIC-69 for the Motorola 6800 and 6809 microprocessors respectively, running the FLEX operating systems, and also mention OEM versions for Perkin-Elmer, Ohio Nuclear, Pertec and Societe Occitane d'Electronique systems.[11] It seems likely this is what is also the basis for the Microsoft/Epson BASIC in the Epson HX-20 portable computer, which has two Hitachi 6301 CPUs, which are essentially a "souped up" 6801. Most of the core features in BASIC-68 and BASIC-69 were copied directly from BASIC-80.[original research?]
BASIC-69 was notably also licensed to Tandy, where it formed the nucleus of Color BASIC on the TRS-80 Color Computer.[citation needed] Not to be confused with BASIC09, a very different BASIC created by Microware as the main language for its OS-9, the other OS available on the Color Computer (Microware also wrote version 2.0 of Extended Color BASIC when Microsoft refused to do it). Microsoft BASIC was also included in the Dragon 32 / 64 computers that were built in Wales and enjoyed some limited success in the UK home computer market in the early 1980s. Dragon computers were mostly compatible with the Color Computer, as they were built on very similar hardware.
Microsoft produced a ROM-based MSX BASIC for use in MSX home computers, which used a Z80 processor. This version supported the graphics and sound systems of the MSX computers; some variants also had support for disk drives.
No variety of Microsoft BASIC (BASICA, GW-BASIC, QuickBASIC, QBasic) is currently distributed with Microsoft Windows or DOS. However, versions that will still run on modern machines can be downloaded from various Internet sites or be found on old DOS disks.
The latest incarnation of Microsoft BASIC is Visual Basic .NET, which incorporates some features from C++ and C# and can be used to develop Web forms, Windows forms, console applications and server-based applications. Most .NET code samples are presented in VB.NET as well as C#, and VB.NET continues to be favored by former Visual Basic programmers.
In October 2008, Microsoft released Small Basic.[12] The language has only 14 keywords.[13] Small Basic Version 1.0 (12 June 2011)[14] was released with an updated Microsoft MSDN Web site that included a full teacher curriculum,[15] a Getting Started Guide,[16] and several e-books.[17] Small Basic exists to help students as young as age eight[18] learn the foundations of computer programming and then graduate to Visual Basic via the downloadable software, Visual Studio Express, where they can continue to build on the foundation by learning Visual C#, VB.NET, and Visual C++.[19]
Bill Gates released Microsoft's original source code, written in 8080 assembly and originally running on an Intel 8080 emulator on a PDP-10 mainframe at Harvard, to celebrate Microsoft's 50th anniversary.[20] This code, which Gates considers his "coolest," was inspired by the Altair 8800 and involved creating a BASIC interpreter and simulating the Intel 8080 chip. The 157-page PDF of the scanned code is available for viewing, offering a glimpse into Microsoft's early history.[21][22][23]
In September 2025, Microsoft open-sourced 6502 BASIC.[24][25][26]
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
Microsoft Small Basic is a programming language, interpreter and associated IDE. Microsoft's simplified variant of BASIC, it is designed to help students who have learnt visual programming languages such as Scratch learn text-based programming. The associated IDE provides a simplified programming environment with functionality such as syntax highlighting, intelligent code completion, and in-editor documentation access. The language has only 14 keywords.
Basic-256 is a project to learn the basics of computer programming. The project started in 2007 inspired by the article “Why Johnny can't code” by David Brin, which also inspired the creation of Microsoft Small Basic. Its main focus is to provide a simple and comprehensive environment for middle/high school students to learn the basics of computer programming. Basic-256 started as a simple version of BASIC: the code editor, text output window and graphics display window are all visible in the same screen. However, successive versions have added new features, namely: Files (Eof, Size) – Version 9.4d Mouse events – Version 9.4d Sprites handling – Version 0.9.6n Database functions – Version 0.9.6y Network – Version 0.9.6.31 Real Functions and Subroutines – Version 0.9.9.1 Maps (Dictionaries) – Version 2.0.0.1 Complete documentation is available in English, Russian, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese.
Microsoft BASIC is the foundation software product of the Microsoft company and evolved into a line of BASIC interpreters and compiler(s) adapted for many different microcomputers. It first appeared in 1975 as Altair BASIC, which was the first version of BASIC published by Microsoft as well as the first high-level programming language available for the Altair 8800 microcomputer. During the home computer craze of the late-1970s and early-1980s, Microsoft BASIC was ported to and supplied with many home computer designs. Slight variations to add support for machine-specific functions, especially graphics, led to a profusion of related designs like Commodore BASIC and Atari Microsoft BASIC. As the early home computers gave way to newer designs like the IBM Personal Computer and Macintosh, BASIC was no longer as widely used, although it retained a strong following. The release of Visual Basic rebooted its popularity and it remains in wide use on Microsoft Windows platforms in its most recent incarnation, Visual Basic .NET.
BASIC (Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College in 1964. They wanted to enable students in non-scientific fields to use computers. At the time, nearly all computers required writing custom software, which only scientists and mathematicians tended to learn. In addition to the programming language, Kemeny and Kurtz developed the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System (DTSS), which allowed multiple users to edit and run BASIC programs simultaneously on remote terminals. This general model became popular on minicomputer systems like the PDP-11 and Data 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 development of multiple BASIC dialects, including Microsoft BASIC in 1975. Due to the tiny main memory available on these machines, often 4 KB, a variety of Tiny BASIC dialects were also created. BASIC was available for almost any system of the era and became the de facto programming language for home computer systems that emerged in the late 1970s. These PCs almost always had a BASIC interpreter installed by default, often in the machine's firmware or sometimes on a ROM cartridge. BASIC declined in popularity in the 1990s, as more powerful microcomputers came to market and programming languages with advanced features (such as Pascal and C) became tenable on such computers. By then, most nontechnical personal computer users relied on pre-written applications rather than writing their own programs. 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 in the form of VB.NET, while a hobbyist scene for BASIC more broadly continues to exist.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →The Greenwood District.