21 Apr
2021
21 Apr
'21
4:19 a.m.
It is not too hard to imagine a professional programmer who took a copy of
Dartmouth BASIC and adapted it for this flavor of BASIC, but I personally
dont have any reference docs about it or proof.
If there are FORTRAN-esque commands added to the core Dartmouth version I
would search for another instance prior to MINICAL where this was done.
Back then BASIC flavors and adaptations were becomming common so it may
simply be MINICAL BASIC would have been just as easy for a period
programmer to whip up from scratch.
Bill
On Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 4:50 AM Christian Corti via cctalk <
cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
Hi,
I'm trying to find out if the BASIC dialect that was available for the
MINCAL computers (aboutn 1971) was something derived from another "system"
or whether it was an own dialect.
Some characteristic instructions that I can't find somewhere else are:
- Formatted output with PRINT FOR(<FORTRAN like description>)
Example: PRINT FOR(F5.0)500.1
- Computed GOTO with GOTO <expression> OF n1,n2,...
Example: GOTO A+B+1 OF 100,20,50
- Presence of "DEF FN", lack of RESTORE for DATA/READ constructs.
This BASIC must have been around 1970-1972.
Christian