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Incompatibilities with "real" classic BASIC
Posted February 1st, 2008 by nikkoThere are a few differences that I know of between Quite BASIC and many of the "real" classic BASIC implementations. I want to fix them all but I don't seem to have enough time. If I get feedback on what is the most important, it may help me focus so I'd appreciate feedback.
Here are some:
- INPUT. Quite BASIC only allows one variable input per INPUT command. Many classic BASIC versions allow multiple variable input delimited by semicolon. High priority
- DEF. Quite BASIC does not support the DEF keyword for creating new functions. High priority.
- Function names. There could be differences in the naming of functions. Medium priority.
- Escape characters. Quite BASIC doesn't really have a "terminal" so priniting special charcters doesn't have the effect of doing things like repositioning the cursor etc. This is pretty hard and may never be fixed. :( Low priority.
- FIXED! "ON" command. This ugly syntax is used in many early BASIC programs.
- FIXED! Multidimensional arrays. Quite BASIC now (May 1008) supports multi dimensional arrays.
- FIXED! Array indices can now (May 2008) be either enclosed by parentheses or brackes! Like this: A[5] or like this: A(5).
- FIXED! As of today, colon works properly to delimit commands on the same line.
- FIXED! Variable names. Quite BASIC used to only allow single letter variables. This is fixed as of Feb 3, 2008. Now variable names are a letter followed by optional digits. Also we allow a $ sign to appended to variable names.
- FIXED (for 1-dim)! Arrays. Initially only the non-standars ARRAY keyword was supported. On Feb 2, 2008 I deployed a fix so that the DIM keywork is now supported. However, only one-dimensional arrays are supported.