🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <01bc1f78$4ecc9c20$86c07182@dixond.McMaster>, "Grant Dixon" <dixon@dogwood.physics.mcmaster.ca> wrote:
>Michael Martinez <michaelm@basis.com> wrote in article 
>>Michael Martinez wrote:
>>> 
>>> BASIC runs in over 1,000 implementations -- over 2,000 by some
>estimates.
>>                     ^^^^^                         ^^^^^
>
>What do you think should we start a list?  Here are the Basics I am using
>or have used in the past.  Although you can argue over how BASIC some of
>them are the all have a BASIC flavour.

I don't know if we can even come close to listing them all.  Note that I've 
set my followup-to line to the two generic BASIC groups.  I'm sure this list 
doesn't need to be propagated any more in the Pascal groups.

My opinion is that, in order to be considered a BASIC, a language should 
support AT LEAST the following syntax (not necessarily exactly as given):

CHAIN/CALL/SWAP (these basically replace the workspace program or
   invoke a separate program space with another program)
CLOSE
DATA
DEF FN...
DELETE  (interpretive only)
DIM
FOR
GOSUB
GOTO
IF...THEN..ELSE
INPUT
LET
LEN()/LENGTH()
LOAD (interpretive only)
NEXT
NUM()/VAL()
ON...GOSUB...
ON...GOTO...
OPEN
PRINT
READ
REM
RENUM (interpretive only, where line numbers are used)
RUN (interpretive only)
STR()/STR$()


Optional features (mostly modern stuff):

line numbers (most modern BASICs can dispense with them)
REPEAT...UNTIL
WHILE...WEND


Perhaps I should note that last year BASIS (my employer) gave some information 
about Business BASIC to a writer who was developing a program for Nova (I 
think) on the BASIC programming language.  He actually had a fairly good 
subset of standard BASIC that he was using to write a multi-language 
syntactically correct program for the show.  However, I lost his email when my 
hard drive crashed and I don't know what became of the project.


>VAX BASIC
>Shepardson Basic
>BASICA
>MS BASIC
>GWBASIC
>Turbo BASIC
>QuickBASIC
>QBASIC
>dBase 
>Clipper
>Force (Half BASIC, mixed with a little C and Pascal)
>UDF - An industrial BASIC used in building control systems (HVAC)
>Enable Basic a TurboCAD V3.0 script language
>Novell's Script Language (looks like BASIC to me)
>ORACLE
>SQL (Sorta)
>ProComm Script
>MicroSoft's Dial up Script
>Visual Basic
>VB Application
>VBScript

I don't consider SQL to be a BASIC programming language.

Well, let's see, off the top of my head (and I've not worked with all these, 
mind you):

IBM Mainframe BASIC (a Dartmouth knockoff)
Burroughs BASIC (another Dartmouth knockoff)
CANDE (Burroughs interpreted/interactive BASIC)
HONEYWELL BASIC (I never used this)
UNIVAC Mainframe BASIC (a Dartmouth knockoff)
CDC's BASIC (a Dartmouth knockoff)
IBM System/36 BASIC

I think there is an AS/400 BASIC, but I may be mistaken.

(I'm fairly certain NCR, General Electric, and the other mainframe vendors 
that dominated in the 1960s/70s probably offered BASIC, too).

Time-Sharing BASIC (I'm not certain of who developed this)

MAI 13xx Business BASIC
MAI OpenBasic  (there was a set of intermediate MAI Business BASICs as well)
BASIS' BBx and PRO/5  (BBx has gone through four progressions)
BASIS Visual PRO/5
Sybex' ProvideX
Sybex Business Basic
Microshare Business BASIC
REXON Business BASIC
PRIME Business BASIC
Pluto Business BASIC
SMBasic
SMC BASIC (an older version of Thoruoghbred)
Thoroughbred Business BASIC


Data General Business BASIC
B32 Business BASIC
Universal Business BASIC
Universal Business Language (came out of B32 and UBB)
Bluebird Business BASIC

IRIS (a Business BASIC-like language)
Unibasic

WangBASIC
KCML
NIAKWA

Theos Business BASIC
AlphaBasic

TI-BASIC

Microsoft's MBASIC
AppleBASIC
whatever that BASIC was called that ran some of the dam equipment
MAPBASIC
ImageBASIC (I'm still not sure if this is the correct name)

Unfortunately I lost the thread with the history of Business BASIC where the 
old-timers listed all the systems they had once worked with in the hard drive 
crash last year.  There were many more Business BASICs than I can list above.


Anyway, I'm afraid I've now spent far too much time on this.  I can't begin to 
accurately list all the BASICs.


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