does anyone out there like BASIC programming languages

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betamaxx
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19 Sep 2010, 4:53 am

even though its one of the more pointless programming languages nowadays does anyone like BASIC programming specifically c64 BASIC

you could even reply with programmes to try if wanted



one-A-N
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19 Sep 2010, 5:41 am

100 PRINT "I like BASIC programming languages."
200 PRINT "BASIC was the first programming language that I learned."
300 END

These, days, however, I program in PHP.

And I learned BASIC on an Apple IIe, not a C64.



rchamberlin
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19 Sep 2010, 8:21 am

I personally like REXX.

Learned it while working at IBM and found it to be one of the easiest to learn and use languages I've found.

It was perfect for prototyping an application, but in many cases, it was fast enough as an interpreted language to leave as is.

I left programming about the time the push was on to go to Object Oriented Programming, and I never went in that direction. Although, OOP fits in with my mindset very well.

I too learned to program in Basic, and it was on a Commodore PET - 8k memory.



t0
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19 Sep 2010, 11:24 am

BASIC on the C64 was my first programming experience. I used to write Zork clones in BASIC as a kid. Now I still use VB for small scripts but it's not really the same thing.



Asterisp
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19 Sep 2010, 11:29 am

My first programming was done in MSX BASIC. It was a first step toward my job, although I did not know it at that time.
Among other languages I program now in Cobol, a bit similar to BASIC.



iceb
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19 Sep 2010, 11:59 am

Yes still a favourite first language I learnt :)


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betamaxx
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20 Sep 2010, 5:08 am

i want to learn different programming languages any suggestions



drybones
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20 Sep 2010, 5:22 am

C64 BASIC was first language I used too

I code in Perl now



peterd
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20 Sep 2010, 6:22 am

I learned Dartmouth BASIC back in '74 and Wang 2200 Basic not long afterwards - I wrote a lovely little data capture and word processing application (life insurance) on a Wang 2200 in '76. Not that it lasted long...



LordoftheMonkeys
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20 Sep 2010, 2:32 pm

I don't like the way BASIC is structured. It doesn't teach programming skills very well and is therefore kind of pointless as a beginning language. This includes Visual Basic and VBA, not just classic BASIC.


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Ancalagon
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20 Sep 2010, 7:33 pm

LordoftheMonkeys wrote:
I don't like the way BASIC is structured. It doesn't teach programming skills very well and is therefore kind of pointless as a beginning language.

I have to disagree. Not that BASIC isn't pretty poorly designed from many standpoints, but that it is an actual programming language, which is enough for the very basics.

BASIC was the first language I ever used, and I learned the concepts of for loops, variables, console I/O, debugging, function calls, and graphical output from it. Although I haven't touched BASIC for over a decade, I use these concepts every time I program.

That said, once you're past the basics it's not so great.

Oh, one other thing it taught me: spaghetti code is bad. I learned it from This Program. If you think spaghetti code is good, reading it will change your mind.


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betamaxx
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21 Sep 2010, 2:17 am

i like basic because its so logical and its always 2+2=4
no random operations
unles they are programmed



lau
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22 Sep 2010, 5:41 am

Ancalagon wrote:
LordoftheMonkeys wrote:
I don't like the way BASIC is structured. It doesn't teach programming skills very well and is therefore kind of pointless as a beginning language.

I have to disagree. Not that BASIC isn't pretty poorly designed from many standpoints, but that it is an actual programming language, which is enough for the very basics.

BASIC was the first language I ever used, and I learned the concepts of for loops, variables, console I/O, debugging, function calls, and graphical output from it. Although I haven't touched BASIC for over a decade, I use these concepts every time I program.

That said, once you're past the basics it's not so great.

Oh, one other thing it taught me: spaghetti code is bad. I learned it from This Program. If you think spaghetti code is good, reading it will change your mind.

... and as soon as I looked at your linked example, I started to think about rewriting it in a language that would show the way the algorithm worked.

And, from the point of view of learning programming, maybe BASIC is a very good choice. Rather than having the language try to prevent you writing code that is poorly structured, start off with a language that has almost no structure (i.e. is very close to machine code, in fact), and learn why poor coding causes problems.

Even when coding in BASIC, you can use comments to help the reader (which may well be yourself, a few weeks later) understand what the code is doing. The program you linked to has none, which contributes to its incomprehensibility. (I like a nice octosyllabic word, before midday.)

That program also has a little "afterthought" error check, on line 102, which is incredibly silly. It validates that neither the width or height is given an one, which is silly. A "maze" that happens to be just one cell wide or one cell high is perfectly valid - just remarkably simple to thread. The check (for what it's worth) should validate them both as greater than zero, which at least would be worth the effort.

(Exercises:- Does the program draw 1xN and Nx1 mazes correctly? What happens if height or width is entered as zero? What happens if height or width is entered as negative?)


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ruveyn
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22 Sep 2010, 5:52 am

I prefer PERL

ruveyn



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22 Sep 2010, 10:15 pm

PROGRAM:TI
::
:Lbl A
:ClrHome
:Disp "I PREFER TI-83+"
:Pause
:Lbl B
:Menu("AGREE?","YES!",C,"NO.",D)
:Lbl C
:ClrHome
:Disp "THANKS!"
:Goto E
:Lbl D
:ClrHome
:Disp "TOO BAD."
:Goto E
:Lbl E
:Stop

Although I grew up with a C128, I am better at programing TI-83+ graphing calculators.

My longest program is 8424 bytes and it converts Metric measurements to Standard and vice versa.



rchamberlin
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26 Sep 2010, 11:44 am

I haven't seen anyone mention RPG -

I first learned to program in machine language on the IBM 1800 and 1130.
The only purpose there was to generate small programs, loaded via bit switches,
to run scope loops, which would allow us to troubleshoot to the failing component.

Does anyone code anything in machine language any more?

You could write a loop program that would run in 5 bytes of memory.

Now it's hard to find a program that's smaller than 100meg.

Does nobody remember tight, compact programming anymore???

(insert nostalgic sigh here)
:wink: