[OT] BASIC Factoid (was Re: [Tutor] Functions !)

[Bruce Sass]

On Wed, 29 Aug 2001, Glen Wheeler wrote:

> > On  0, alan.gauld@bt.com wrote:
> > > > > They are similar.  I never did enough BASIC programming to
> > > >
> > > > There's actually a reason for that. All versions of BASIC on
> > > > early PCs were written by, licensed from, and "maintained"
> > > > by Microsoft. And you thought BASIC was public domain :P
> > >
> > > Gosh, I can't believe I'm aplogising for either MS or BASIC!
> > >
> > > However in the pre IBM PC days BASICs were split about 50/50
> > > between MS BASIC - A triuly dire but very small ROM version(4K?)
> > > and various proprietary ones. Commodore used Comodore BASIC
> > > which was all their own.
> >
> > I'm not sure. The Commodore 128's startup screen looks like this:
> >
> > COMMODORE BASIC V7.0 122365 BYTES FREE
> >   (C)1985 COMMODORE ELECTRONICS, LTD.
> >         (C)1977 MICROSOFT CORP.
> >   ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
> >
>
>   But what about the C64?  I don't have that great a memory but I don't
> recall a microsoft tag on it's BASIC.  Of course I am probably wrong :)

It didn't say MS, but it was written by MS... not sure about the VIC20
though.

>   Ha ha, yes yes the good old days...man you have me winding back the clock.
> I was but a little 'un all the way back then too.  I still remember being
> about 10 years old pumping in a hexadecimal Q-Bert game from a C64 mag :)
>   Damn, wish I still had that thing.

What's it worth to you... I got three sitting around (one even has a
RTC, extra I/O hacked into the address space, and all the bits needed
to bump it up to a C256 or C512.  :-)


- Bruce