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There is also the popular conspiracy theory that Apple was somehow opposed to allowing users to program the Mac. They created a Mac native Basic at launch, and

There is also the popular conspiracy theory that Apple was somehow opposed to allowing users to program the Mac. They created a Mac native Basic at launch, and only Microsoft's anticompetitive arm twisting kept if from being released.

Nevermark 3y ago
> They created a Mac native Basic at launch, and only Microsoft's anticompetitive arm twisting kept if from being released. Wow, that almost makes me want to cry. I discovered personal computers when the computer basically felt like a programming language. I might be wrong, but if a friendly language installed on every computer out of the box had held, the evolution of “people’s” languages might have been a huge thing to this day.
flomo 3y ago
Not disagreeing with your point about MS, but it's not a conspiracy theory that Macintosh dev tools were nonexistent. Apple's solution was "buy a Lisa". (well, maybe they considered this a 3rd party opportunity.) No indication they even wanted homegrown BASIC type stuff.
- sbuk 3y ago
  > No indication they even wanted homegrown BASIC type stuff. Further up this very thread is a link from a first party source that refutes that entirely.
  - flomo 3y ago
    No, not at all, the folklore story doesn't even address Apple's strategy. Their developer relations were "Apply Here" back then. Macintosh shipped with zero developer tooling, not C/C++, not Pascal, not BASIC. And, we have no idea what Donn's BASIC was actually like ... it probably wasn't "Visual Basic", or even a platform. Just better than Microsoft's halfazz port of their micro basic. (which did have some quickdraw commands.)
    - GeekyBear 3y ago
      > we have no idea what Donn's BASIC was actually like We literally know exactly what it was like. Dartmouth was already using a late beta of the software for a Basic class when Microsoft forced Apple to cancel the release of the final version.
    - mainland 3y ago
      If you'd like to see what Donn's BASIC was like, you can! The Internet Archive has a version that runs in-browser [1]. Although the Folklore article says there were two books describing Donn's BASIC, I believe there were at least three: Introduction to Macintosh BASIC, Using Macintosh BASIC, and The Macintosh BASIC Handbook. All three are available at vintageapple.org [2]. [1] https://archive.org/details/mac_MacBASIC.335 https://archive.org/details/mac_MacBASIC.335 [2] https://vintageapple.org/macprogramming/ https://vintageapple.org/macprogramming/
      - flomo 3y ago
        Thanks! I had no idea it was out there. (Although it looks like it's not very 'visual'.)

Nevermark 3y ago

> They created a Mac native Basic at launch, and only Microsoft's anticompetitive arm twisting kept if from being released. Wow, that almost makes me want to cry. I discovered personal computers when the computer basically felt like a programming language. I might be wrong, but if a friendly language installed on every computer out of the box had held, the evolution of “people’s” languages might have been a huge thing to this day.

flomo 3y ago

Not disagreeing with your point about MS, but it's not a conspiracy theory that Macintosh dev tools were nonexistent. Apple's solution was "buy a Lisa". (well, maybe they considered this a 3rd party opportunity.) No indication they even wanted homegrown BASIC type stuff.

sbuk 3y ago
> No indication they even wanted homegrown BASIC type stuff. Further up this very thread is a link from a first party source that refutes that entirely.
- flomo 3y ago
  No, not at all, the folklore story doesn't even address Apple's strategy. Their developer relations were "Apply Here" back then. Macintosh shipped with zero developer tooling, not C/C++, not Pascal, not BASIC. And, we have no idea what Donn's BASIC was actually like ... it probably wasn't "Visual Basic", or even a platform. Just better than Microsoft's halfazz port of their micro basic. (which did have some quickdraw commands.)
  - GeekyBear 3y ago
    > we have no idea what Donn's BASIC was actually like We literally know exactly what it was like. Dartmouth was already using a late beta of the software for a Basic class when Microsoft forced Apple to cancel the release of the final version.
  - mainland 3y ago
    If you'd like to see what Donn's BASIC was like, you can! The Internet Archive has a version that runs in-browser [1]. Although the Folklore article says there were two books describing Donn's BASIC, I believe there were at least three: Introduction to Macintosh BASIC, Using Macintosh BASIC, and The Macintosh BASIC Handbook. All three are available at vintageapple.org [2]. [1] https://archive.org/details/mac_MacBASIC.335 https://archive.org/details/mac_MacBASIC.335 [2] https://vintageapple.org/macprogramming/ https://vintageapple.org/macprogramming/
    - flomo 3y ago
      Thanks! I had no idea it was out there. (Although it looks like it's not very 'visual'.)