I've always been a big fan of the Forth programming language. It is nothing like BASIC, but here is a page from forth.com with some words of wisdom from Chuck Moore that I figure are just good food for thought no matter what language you prefer.
http://www.forth.com/resources/evolution/evolve_1.html
Showing posts with label basic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label basic. Show all posts
BASIC and Space Flight!
The same fellow who created an OpenGL flight simulator in Liberty BASIC has taken it a step further by creating a spaceflight simulator with a map editor. Very neat!
Check it out
Check it out
BASIC, Lasers, and you
Here's an interesting example of the perfect use for BASIC. If you're into laser tag and programming this may be your ticket. It's cool that the makers of this device decided to write the config tool in Liberty BASIC, and that they make the code available so the average Joe can customize it. That's in the spirit of BASIC. Programming for the non-programmer.
http://www.lasertagparts.com/mtmicro.htm
http://www.lasertagparts.com/mtmicro.htm
Fractals in a page of code
What's great about BASIC and languages like it is that you don't have a write a lot of code that has nothing to do with what you're trying to create (like Java for example). It should be really easy to throw together a little code and play with graphics. Programming should be fun, not a burden.
Here is a thread that shows how to draw fractals in less than a page of BASIC.
Click to read the thread
Here is a thread that shows how to draw fractals in less than a page of BASIC.
Click to read the thread
Levity and Programming
BASIC is the perfect programming language to a lighthearted programming challenge, and I'm about to prove it to you. What better matchup between BASIC than Paper, Rock, Scissors?
Check it out. It's great to see people programming just for fun.
Check it out. It's great to see people programming just for fun.
Programming tools in BASIC
Alyce Watson has updated her CodeAChrome widget, which is a syntax coloring editor specially made for editing BASIC source code. It's small, simple to use, and free! Check out her announcement here.
Earth shaking!
Here's a neat example of BASIC programming which plots earthquake data graphically. What's cool about this is that it demonstrates graphics, interfacing with VBScript, and getting information off the Internet. Add to this that it's not a large program.
Who says you can't do that in BASIC?
Over at the Liberty BASIC forum on Conforums they've announced a programmer of the month for September. Chung, a prolific Liberty BASIC programmer has created an OpenGL flight simulator in Liberty BASIC. Very, very nice!
Click to read the announcement and make sure to follow the link to Chung's site to see the flight simulator!
Searching for BASIC
When people search for BASIC online using Google or Bing, or whatever, what keywords do they search with? Some of the obvious choices to me are:
- basic
- basic for windows
- qbasic
- visual basic
- vb
How would you search for BASIC?
Joy in Programming
I responded to a post on another blog (http://blogten.blogspot.com/2009/05/wards-comment.html) about how someone complained that the Smalltalk programming language permits the programmer too much freedom and that it's "too easy." The argument against being easy is that if it's too easy the programmer will be able to rush into creating software that is designed poorly. I have a hard time believing it is ever a benefit that something is hard to do. I think this applies to languages like BASIC so I'm copying what I posted there below.
Freedom is essential if you want to live life to the full, and not just in software development. We need to teach what is the best way to live in freedom, not impose a tyranny of suffocating "safety". If we don't build a culture of discipline and excellence then we deserve what we get. If we impose tons of rules to in an effort to prevent people from making mistakes we risk making software development such a burden that few people will want to do it anymore. It should be possible for software development to be an enjoyable activity, and for innovation and discovery to be experienced by newbies and experts. Joy is important in life.
Perhaps I oversimplify, but I hope this communicates an important idea effectively.
Imposter?
I found an article named Web programming is hard to do right by a fellow named Bert Hubert. He does a nice job of explaining what is so hard about web programming and then goes on to describe how it could be done right. He even includes some BASIC code as an example. I like the questions he asks:
He provides some C-like code implementing what the BASIC code does. I guess that this new scripting language is code for a language called Imposter by Gabor Vitez which he mentions in a note at the top of his article.
I did a quick search for information about Imposter and its author but it seems to have withdrawn from the Internet. Does anyone know where to get a copy of Imposter to have a look?
- How did we arrive at this mess?
- That's just the way it works, isn't it?
- How should it be then?
- Why not go back to the old days?
He provides some C-like code implementing what the BASIC code does. I guess that this new scripting language is code for a language called Imposter by Gabor Vitez which he mentions in a note at the top of his article.
I did a quick search for information about Imposter and its author but it seems to have withdrawn from the Internet. Does anyone know where to get a copy of Imposter to have a look?
Rewrite BASIC language today?
In the Usenet group alt.lang.basic there was a thread recently with the subject heading "Rewrite BASIC language today?" where the question was explored about how BASIC would be written in today's programming world.
Clearly there is a wide range of opinions in the responses. Some opted for being retro and simple. Some advocated adding commands for dealing with various things. It's good to have a discussion about these sorts of things, and this one went well. There are a lot of experienced BASIC programmers in that forum and it didn't turn into a flame war.
In my own response I wrote "BASIC needs to be simple. Adding C or Java features is a mistake for the most part. There is value in keeping things out of the language."
There needs to be a balance. Sometimes it makes good sense to add new things to a language. But as I just said... sometimes. ;-)
Clearly there is a wide range of opinions in the responses. Some opted for being retro and simple. Some advocated adding commands for dealing with various things. It's good to have a discussion about these sorts of things, and this one went well. There are a lot of experienced BASIC programmers in that forum and it didn't turn into a flame war.
In my own response I wrote "BASIC needs to be simple. Adding C or Java features is a mistake for the most part. There is value in keeping things out of the language."
There needs to be a balance. Sometimes it makes good sense to add new things to a language. But as I just said... sometimes. ;-)
Commodore 64 Twenty-fifth Anniversary
Here is a YouTube video of a 90 minute presentation celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Commodore 64 home computer. The C64 was a groundbreaking machine and I know I'm not the only one who learned a lot from this wonderful machine and similar ones like the TRS-80, the Apple II, the Atari 800, and the TI-99/4. I programmed Commodore computers in BASIC, 6502 assembly language and Forth. Great stuff.
Go check this out for a fun romp into the past. The presentation touches on much more than just the C64. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3754836267385299753
Go check this out for a fun romp into the past. The presentation touches on much more than just the C64. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3754836267385299753
Think programming is too hard, or boring? Think again!
A couple of days ago I was at a Starbucks. I sat down around a large table to enjoy my coffee and a pastry. There were several other people there. I pulled out my iPhone to check my email. There was a fellow across from me with one of the new Macbook Air laptops, and a few minutes later a young man also sat down and pulled out a black Macbook. This concentration of Apple equipment made it easy for us to begin talking.
When it came to what sort of work we do, I shared about my business selling programming tools. I moved over to the fellow with the black Macbook and told him I wanted to show him my website so he could understand my business. When I showed him the Learn tab on the Run BASIC site and began to walk him through the examples the other people at the table came over to watch. As we went from simple "hello world!" to some easy graphics examples the reaction from onlookers was amazement! They clearly were not aware that programming could be so simple and cool. To them this was something way above them, and very dry.
What I took away from this is that people don't know that programming can be fun. They can do it, and years ago the average computer user did his own programming, in BASIC. Nowadays what gets promoted as programming is too hard, and it's no surprise that people don't want to do that. This is a misapplication of technology that makes things harder, and not easier.
We need to turn back the clock in this important area of programming.
When it came to what sort of work we do, I shared about my business selling programming tools. I moved over to the fellow with the black Macbook and told him I wanted to show him my website so he could understand my business. When I showed him the Learn tab on the Run BASIC site and began to walk him through the examples the other people at the table came over to watch. As we went from simple "hello world!" to some easy graphics examples the reaction from onlookers was amazement! They clearly were not aware that programming could be so simple and cool. To them this was something way above them, and very dry.
What I took away from this is that people don't know that programming can be fun. They can do it, and years ago the average computer user did his own programming, in BASIC. Nowadays what gets promoted as programming is too hard, and it's no surprise that people don't want to do that. This is a misapplication of technology that makes things harder, and not easier.
We need to turn back the clock in this important area of programming.
iPhone SDK delayed?
It's beginning to look as though the iPhone SDK may not ship this month since Apple has been silent about it. It was supposed to ship by the end of February. Of course this doesn't really have any impact on Run BASIC since it will not use the SDK, but it will produce apps that run in the iPhone's Safari web browser.
We haven't talked much about our plans for iPhone support in Run BASIC. We should have more to say in the next month or so.
We haven't talked much about our plans for iPhone support in Run BASIC. We should have more to say in the next month or so.
BASIC is bad because it's too easy?
A response to a recent post read, "BASIC is good, but I think it should be avoided as a first language because it pampers the programmer too much."
I won't be the first person to say that BASIC is perfect. There is no perfect language. However, to recommend that a first language should not "pamper" the beginning programmer seems to me misses the mark completely.
I'm guessing that this means that languages should force the beginner to be aware of low level details such as the type of numeric value (int, float, byte, etc.) or that the beginner should made to manage the allocation and deallocation of memory. What do these sorts of things have to do with the essense of programming? Since there are many languages which do not have these kinds of features, I can only submit that they aren't essential to programming. Therefore they are not necessary ideas to teach the beginner.
The nitty gritty details of how a computer works ARE important. These things should be taught to any serious student of computers, but they do not need to be the first thing taught. People who do not fancy themselves experts do not need to be bothered to learn them.
Easy is the quality that BASIC has, especially in the quickness of its learnability. This is almost to a fault I agree in the sense that a slightly more general and abstract language might be a little harder to warm up to but better in the long haul. However for the person who programs for fun, or who needs a light language for writing utilities or small personal applications, I think BASIC hits the mark pretty well.
I won't be the first person to say that BASIC is perfect. There is no perfect language. However, to recommend that a first language should not "pamper" the beginning programmer seems to me misses the mark completely.
I'm guessing that this means that languages should force the beginner to be aware of low level details such as the type of numeric value (int, float, byte, etc.) or that the beginner should made to manage the allocation and deallocation of memory. What do these sorts of things have to do with the essense of programming? Since there are many languages which do not have these kinds of features, I can only submit that they aren't essential to programming. Therefore they are not necessary ideas to teach the beginner.
The nitty gritty details of how a computer works ARE important. These things should be taught to any serious student of computers, but they do not need to be the first thing taught. People who do not fancy themselves experts do not need to be bothered to learn them.
Easy is the quality that BASIC has, especially in the quickness of its learnability. This is almost to a fault I agree in the sense that a slightly more general and abstract language might be a little harder to warm up to but better in the long haul. However for the person who programs for fun, or who needs a light language for writing utilities or small personal applications, I think BASIC hits the mark pretty well.
Taking the Arc Challenge
Paul Graham, a very famous Lisp programmer who is well known for his continuations based web framework has invented a language called Arc (a version of Lisp). He came up with a challenge to see how others would implement a trivial web program in their favorite language.
Here's the Arc program:
Here's the Arc program:
(defop said req
(aform [w/link (pr "you said: " (arg _ "foo"))
(pr "click here")]
(input "foo")
(submit)))
Follow this link to see other submissions in different languages. Scroll down to to bottom to see the Run BASIC example. http://arclanguage.org/item?id=722
Now tell me which language you'd rather develop web apps in. BASIC is the one. ;-)Web programming in... Java?
I mean, why? Of course that's how I feel about any kind of programming in Java. I recently found a blog where someone reviewed Wallace Wang's Beginning Programming book which teaches Liberty BASIC. The blogger seemed to enjoy Liberty BASIC and then went on to say that we was planning to learn Java. I wish that those presidential candidates would promise to reform our educational system by banning Java from k12 schools. People who are just learning programming need something that gives them a tighter feedback loop like BASIC does. If the learning experience isn't at least a little bit of fun it won't benefit the kids. Period.
People who trash BASIC haven't tried modern versions. Even the old DOS QBasic has everything the beginner needs.
People who trash BASIC haven't tried modern versions. Even the old DOS QBasic has everything the beginner needs.
Knocked on the head with BASIC
A close friend of mine schooled in C++, Smalltalk, Java and Groovy told me the other day that he has written his first BASIC program by using Run BASIC. He had never written code in BASIC before, but he took my word for it that BASIC is a great language for throwing together solutions quickly. He said he was struck by the lightness of the BASIC language and that he enjoyed working in it. This is my paraphrase of what he said, because I don't remember his exact words.
I know there are a lot of modern BASIC implementations that force you to declare all your variables and give them types and sizes. Some of them keep the core keywords but add Pascal syntax, and some make BASIC look more like Java. I know there are some benefits to the way these other languages work, but BASIC is really meant to be very light and simple. In my humble opinion any language claiming to be BASIC which forces the programmer to dot too many i's and cross too many t's is not BASIC, but an imposter.
BASIC is a small language without too many rules.
I know there are a lot of modern BASIC implementations that force you to declare all your variables and give them types and sizes. Some of them keep the core keywords but add Pascal syntax, and some make BASIC look more like Java. I know there are some benefits to the way these other languages work, but BASIC is really meant to be very light and simple. In my humble opinion any language claiming to be BASIC which forces the programmer to dot too many i's and cross too many t's is not BASIC, but an imposter.
BASIC is a small language without too many rules.
Debugging Run BASIC Web Apps
In Run BASIC's first release there is effectively no built-in debugger. Of course you can use print to log to the browser page or to a file, and this is no more or less than many other web scripting systems. We aim to do something about this in the very near future.
One of our users suggested that it would be good to create an inspector panel in Run BASIC itself and that we should add some reflection via an EVAL$() function that would allow arbitrary execution of BASIC code at runtime. We would probably also need to at least metaprogramming features like the ability to get information from the runtime like:
One of our users suggested that it would be good to create an inspector panel in Run BASIC itself and that we should add some reflection via an EVAL$() function that would allow arbitrary execution of BASIC code at runtime. We would probably also need to at least metaprogramming features like the ability to get information from the runtime like:
- The name of the current context (ie. function or subroutine)
- The names of all the variables and arrays in scope
- The source code for the current context
- A collection of objects that models the stack
- Probably more stuff
While this sort of thing is possible I think that we probably will initially provide a high level runtime inspection panel that the programmer can show and hide as needed. This is BASIC after all, and it should be as easy as possible to use. The metaprogramming stuff is cool though. ;-)
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