🚀 go-pugleaf

In message <330B9672.5722@gmr.com> Craig Jackson <"cackson[NO SPAM FOR 
ME]"@rcsuna.gmr.com> wrote:
>
>(Reply posted and mailed)
>
>Michael Martinez wrote:
>> 
>> BASIC runs in over 1,000 implementations -- over 2,000 by some estimates.
>                     ^^^^^                         ^^^^^
>
>I find these numbers extremely hard to believe.  Can you provide 
>us with a reference to substantiate this claim?

Not today, no.  The 1,000 number comes from a textbook I had in college which 
I may or may not still have.  However, I may be able to give you something to 
consider based on my personal exposure to BASIC.

I work with Business BASIC.  Late in 1995 I started a discussion among the 
"old-timers" in the BBx (that's an implementation of Business BASIC) community 
about the many implementations of Business BASIC.

We counted over 30, of which I've programmed in 4 or 5.  And I'm speaking of 
implementations by vendor, not implementations by generation (BASIS, the 
company I work for, has produced five generations of Business BASIC).

When I was in technical school way back before college, I learned Dartmouth 
BASIC as implemented  on IBM and Burroughs mainframes from a couple of books, 
including a Univac BASIC book (I had only the Burroughs machine to work with). 
 I also had a book called PROGRAMMING TIME-SHARED COMPUTERS IN BASIC, written 
in the 60s and revised in the 70s, long since borrowed from me and never 
returnd.  It claimed hundreds of implementations of BASIC existed.

My former father-in-law worked in a dam associated with the Tennessee River 
Valley project that used a BASIC to program some of their timing equipment 
(they had nearly automated the entire dam).

When I was a teenager (back in the 70s) I studied a time-sharing BASIC that 
was on, I think, the Plato network (I may be mistaken -- Plato terminals were 
in the same building but we might have been using a different system 
altogether).

In college I programmed in Cromemco Structured BASIC and the Dartmouth variant 
supplied by CDC.

I've seen at least a couple dozen BASICs mentioned here in the news groups, 
but they are just PC BASICs.

My experience with BASIC is very limited, although I've programmed in 
Microsoft's GW-BASIC, QBASIC, PowerBASIC, PC-BASIC, and a few others I've 
forgotten about as well as the two mainframe BASICs, the various Business 
BASICs, and a few other supermicro BASICs like the Cromemco stuff.


Virtually every text I've read which discusses the widespread implementation 
of BASIC has made the 1,000+ claim.  Sometime in recent years I saw the 2,000+ 
claim.  I *could* track down some references but, to be honest, it's not 
important enough to me to do so.

There are BASICs which were devised by all the mini-computer vendors (well 
over 100), nearly all the mainframe vendors (never more than 20, I don't 
think), and scores and scores of universities, government institutions (I was 
taught in technical school by programmers who had started working in the 40s 
and 60s and who had used or seen some of these other BASICs).  Some mainframe 
vendors offered more than one type of BASIC.  Burroughs, for instance, also 
had a product called CANDE, which was an intepreted BASIC.

>I'm not challanging your claim that BASIC has evolved into
>numerous different versions, each including many useful extensions.
>I just cannot visualize 1,000 distinct BASIC packages, stacked 
>end-to-end.  Surely someone has compiled a list of these 
>implementations somewhere.

The 1,000+ claim may be the equivalent of an urban myth.  I have no 
comprehensive list of all the BASICs.

But there are business applications which come with their own subsets of 
BASIC, there are specialized BASICs which you can find advertised in various 
magazines, etc.


Courtesy copy sent via email.


  ++   ++   "Well Samwise: What do you think of the elves now?"
  ||\ /||                 --fbaggins@mid.earth.com
  || v ||ichael Martinez                    (mmartin@basis.com)
  ++   ++------------------------------------------------------