The BASIC Handbook: An Encyclopedia Of The BASIC Computer Language

by David A. Lien

Book by Lien, David A

360 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1978

Reviews

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was published in 1978, and, according to the notes in the third edition, was started in 1976—the year that the Apple I came out in pre-built form and one year after Altair BASIC came out for the Altair 8800. It was very good timing. In 1977, the TRS-80, Apple II, and Commodore PET brought hobby computers, and BASIC programming, to the mainstream.

The cover is fascinating; all it does is list the computers whose BASICs were consulted for the dictionary, and it includes most of the kit computers and computers that didn’t even have keyboards or monitors, as well as the newer computers:

DEC • IBM • Apple • ADDS • PET • TRS-80 • BASIC-Z • Zilog • Maxi-BASIC • SOL • Level II • T.I. • KIM • Alpha 1 • Altair • H.P. • Microsoft • Heath • SWTPC • Harris • IMSAI

The preface describes the purpose of the book as making it easier to translate programs between all of these incompatible BASIC languages. Because most programs came in print form to be typed in, you could, if you wanted, try to use programs for one computer on another, and you would usually almost succeed.

One thing it doesn’t do is cover statements for “control of peripheral devices, such as disks, tapes, and printers” because the lack of conformity is so severe that “to include them at this point would be premature”. Thus, the very common LPRINT statement and its variants has no listing.

A very useful feature is that many statements include code for what to do if your computer doesn’t have that statement.

BASIC was once looked down on by elitists as a simple-minded computer language of the unwashed masses, and, tho phenomenally powerful, not worthy of respectability. (So was the Volkswagen.) More computers now speak BASIC than any other computer language. Because of BASIC’s simplicity, computer programming (and thereby control) has escaped the grasp of just a select few.

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lien updated his BASIC Handbook twice, as far as I can tell, with a second edition around 1980 and a third edition in 1986. That means it includes entries for Microsoft’s BASIC for the Macintosh.

The introduction is basically the same as for the first edition, with a little added bragging that BASIC is the most popular computing language in the world. He also argues that BASIC does not deserve the disdain it receives “from those who program in the loftier, cryptic and more obscure languages” for its lack of structure because “the human mind flows—sometimes like a brook, sometimes like swirling rapids… BASIC allows the same freedom.”

I can’t tell how many new entries there are, but the number of pages in the dictionary section has increased from 346 in the first edition to 855, and that includes folding some statements into others. The very first two statements from the first edition were A, an abbreviation for ABS (or absolute value) and then ABS itself. Here, both are folded into the same entry. LPRINT has been added, as an adjunct to the PRINT statement. Probably because of this folding, the book also adds a cross-referencing index.

It’s a fascinating snapshot of what was probably at or near the apex of BASIC popularity. Because the operating systems becoming popular in 1986—the Mac’s OS in 1984, Windows in 1985 and 1987—and the software accompanying them made programming less important, computer use rapidly lost its synonymity with computer programming. It was no longer necessary to see the command line where the BASIC interpreter resided even if all you were doing was using it to start up some software application.

Freedom and simplicity give BASIC its popularity. Like a favorite chair, or shoes, BASIC may not be the state of someone’s art, but it sure is comfortable.