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At 4 a.m. on May 1, 1964, in the basement of College Hall, Professor John Kemeny and a student programmer simultaneously typed RUN on neighboring terminals. When they both got back correct answers to their simple programs, time-sharing and BASIC were born. Those innovations made computing accessible to all Dartmouth students and faculty, and soon after, to people across the nation and the world.
Dartmouth's BASIC at 50 anniversary celebration was held yesterday, which included the public premier of a documentary on the history and impact of BASIC.
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Your reasoning powers are good, and you are a fairly good planner.
(Score: 1) by BasilBrush on Thursday May 01 2014, @11:50AM
you can step on the javascript "stone" just as easily.
Not really. BASIC back then (I learned around 1981) was very simple. No libraries. You could master the language without the need to understand blocks, structure, objects or libraries. It was a simple progression from writing a series of steps to describe to a colleague how to do a job, or a students description of how to perform an experiment. The idea of maps directly to
1) ... ... ...
2)
3)
4) Proceed from step 2.
Back then the next progression from BASIC was Pascal. Javascript would be closer to a Pascal level. But even then I think Javascript is more complex. Maybe Object Pascal would be more an equivalent to Javascript. So that's a few steps on from BASIC.
Also, BASIC was a good stepping stone to ASM. And Javascript and other more modern structured and object-oriented languages aren't.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday May 01 2014, @12:06PM
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2, Interesting) by BasilBrush on Thursday May 01 2014, @12:49PM
But they are still there. Which means that you have't learned the language unless you learn them. There is a sense of having "Mastered" the language that they wouldn't get with Javascript. Go through the relatively thin classic "Illustrating BASIC" by Donald Alcock and that was it. From no computer knowledge you had mastered a programming language. My BBC Micro came with a manual called "30 Hour BASIC", and that was realistic timing.
Also only learning a subset of Javascript means that you probably can't understand other peoples source, because you don't know all the features they use. Learn BASIC and you can follow any BASIC program.
This really was one of the great things about the 8-Bit home computer with BASIC era. That you had a feeling of something you could master.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday May 01 2014, @01:22PM
I think you make a confusion between learning to program and mastering a programming language (the later is, at best, a mean for the former). "Mastering BASIC" will only get you to brain-rot in regards with "learning programming". Even more dangerous if "mastering BASIC" comes with a feeling of self-satisfaction and sufficiency.
Remember the '97-'00 (the .com bubble)? Every "programmer" and his dog were paid fortunes only because they could say "they knew how to program in Visual Basic 6.0"; how good was that?
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1) by BasilBrush on Thursday May 01 2014, @02:20PM
I think you make a confusion between learning to program and mastering a programming language (the later is, at best, a mean for the former).
I'm not the slightest bit confused. I said it's just a stepping stone (in the never ending journey of learning to program), but mastering the BASIC language is a good self contained step. One which brings a feeling of having completeness, whether you then go on to study programming further, or take a different path in life.
Remember the '97-'00 (the .com bubble)? Every "programmer" and his dog were paid fortunes only because they could say "they knew how to program in Visual Basic 6.0"; how good was that?
I'm not talking about Visual BASIC. And those "programmers" wouldn't have been any more use if they'd learned a non-object & non-library subset of Javascript instead.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 2) by umafuckitt on Thursday May 01 2014, @01:00PM
One thing I feel makes a good first stepping stone is learning to write C or C++ for an Arduino. The reference page [arduino.cc] is well designed and the example programs show you how to use the syntax. It's exciting for beginners to see their code effecting something in the real world, rather than just print stuff to the terminal. The Arduino guys have gone to some lengths to hide stuff like pointers and function declarations, so it's easy to get started. For those who are interested, it's not hard to graduate to "real" C or C++ without the Arduino training wheels.
(Score: 1) by BasilBrush on Thursday May 01 2014, @02:24PM
Even better are boards based on the Parallax Propeller. There's a dedicated language called SPIN that's very BASIC like whilst also providing very nice low level bit twiddling opportunities. And at a more advanced level, the best introduction to parallel programming anywhere, with a simple to use 32 bit ASM.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 2) by umafuckitt on Thursday May 01 2014, @02:39PM
Ah, I see, the multiple cores look interesting. Personally I have no desire to learn another language right now, it's good to see they have a C and C++ compiler. Maybe I'll buy one and have a play with it.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday May 01 2014, @02:19PM
Also, BASIC was a good stepping stone to ASM. And Javascript and other more modern structured and object-oriented languages aren't.
Also, afaik there weren't any object oriented languages that would run on a PC back then (PCs were pretty primitive).
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