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It should be able to run them without any changes. GW-BASIC was derived from BASICA and is functionally identical. BASICA required the cassette basic rom which

by tssva 2y ago

It should be able to run them without any changes. GW-BASIC was derived from BASICA and is functionally identical. BASICA required the cassette basic rom which shipped with IBM machines and GW-BASIC did not.

fuzzfactor 2y ago
A full version of BASICA.EXE is included in the Program folder with the zipped DOS .BAS program files if you download norton120's package. This BASICA.EXE is the full 79kb GW-Basic 3.22 copyright Microsoft 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987. A different version I have been using for decades is 78kb and launches with a different text header: COMPAQ Personal Computer BASIC Version 3.31 copyright Compaq Computer Corp. 1982, 1988. Copyright Microsoft 1983, 1987. Thought to be equivalent but doesn't say anything about GW-Basic on the Compaq one. I use it to run a program I wrote decades ago to calculate caustic soda according to reporting standards that were already arcane at the time. And GW-Basic was the "new Basic platform" for the IBM PCs and compatibles that looked like they might be here to stay by about then, and beginning to show up in a number of offices. My code was originally written in 1980 on a Hewlett-Packard gas analyzer designed in the 1970's. Even though caustic has nothing to do with gas commodities I was so fortunate to have a benchtop Basic instrument I could do anything with, and caustic was just calculations. Once PCs got more powerful and proliferated I waited a few more years before converting caustic code from HP-Basic to IBM-Basic. HP-Basic was two optional ROMs that cost $1500 you plugged into the instrument PCB. Early IBM-Basic was still ROM-based too, this is the one that was launched from DOS using the 4kb BASICA.COM (rather than basica.exe). So it's the basica.com (sometimes renamed to basica.exe !) that doesn't work when you try to run it, because it is really meant for the antique motherboard with the specific ROMs. If you have both basica.com and basica.exe in the same directory on the command line in DOS, and you type in just "BASICA" without the extension it will run the .com if present (and errorfail with Incorrect DOS Version) rather than the full executable. In the late '80's once it looked like GW-Basic had good penetration, made the final tweaks to my code and ran it under DOS 5, DOS 6. Booted Win3.x and W9x to DOS whenever, and since NT5 just works in a Windows command instance as long as you don't try a 64-bit version of Windows.
- tssva 2y ago
  IBM shipped 3 BASIC interpreters with the PC. Cassette Basic, Disk Basic and BASIC Advanced. Cassette BASIC was contained in a 32k ROM. Disk BASIC depended upon cassette basic but added support for floppies and a few other features. It required the cassette basic rom to be present. It was meant for machines with low memory and was launched via basic.com. Once all PCs shipped with more memory by default basic.com became just a launcher for BASICA for batch file compatibility. BASIC Advanced (BASICA) also required the presence of the cassette BASIC ROM. It added additional features above disk BASIC but required more memory. It was originally launched via basica.com. This eventually changed to basica.exe. At this time basica.com became just a launcher of basica.exe. Non-IBM versions of MS-DOS, at least the versions targeted for PC clones, shipped with basic.com and basica.com being launchers for basica.exe. This is true at least as far back as Compaq DOS 1.10. Earlier versions of MS-DOS were branded by OEMs and included versions of GW-BASIC which didn’t make direct reference to GW-BASIC such as the Compaq example you gave. I have a Zenith Z-161 luggable in my collection and the Zenith version of MS-DOS it runs has a BASIC which is gw -basic but reports itself Zenith BASIC and simply includes Microsoft in the copyright notice.

by tssva 2y ago

fuzzfactor 2y ago

A full version of BASICA.EXE is included in the Program folder with the zipped DOS .BAS program files if you download norton120's package. This BASICA.EXE is the full 79kb GW-Basic 3.22 copyright Microsoft 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987. A different version I have been using for decades is 78kb and launches with a different text header: COMPAQ Personal Computer BASIC Version 3.31 copyright Compaq Computer Corp. 1982, 1988. Copyright Microsoft 1983, 1987. Thought to be equivalent but doesn't say anything about GW-Basic on the Compaq one. I use it to run a program I wrote decades ago to calculate caustic soda according to reporting standards that were already arcane at the time. And GW-Basic was the "new Basic platform" for the IBM PCs and compatibles that looked like they might be here to stay by about then, and beginning to show up in a number of offices. My code was originally written in 1980 on a Hewlett-Packard gas analyzer designed in the 1970's. Even though caustic has nothing to do with gas commodities I was so fortunate to have a benchtop Basic instrument I could do anything with, and caustic was just calculations. Once PCs got more powerful and proliferated I waited a few more years before converting caustic code from HP-Basic to IBM-Basic. HP-Basic was two optional ROMs that cost $1500 you plugged into the instrument PCB. Early IBM-Basic was still ROM-based too, this is the one that was launched from DOS using the 4kb BASICA.COM (rather than basica.exe). So it's the basica.com (sometimes renamed to basica.exe !) that doesn't work when you try to run it, because it is really meant for the antique motherboard with the specific ROMs. If you have both basica.com and basica.exe in the same directory on the command line in DOS, and you type in just "BASICA" without the extension it will run the .com if present (and errorfail with Incorrect DOS Version) rather than the full executable. In the late '80's once it looked like GW-Basic had good penetration, made the final tweaks to my code and ran it under DOS 5, DOS 6. Booted Win3.x and W9x to DOS whenever, and since NT5 just works in a Windows command instance as long as you don't try a 64-bit version of Windows.

tssva 2y ago
IBM shipped 3 BASIC interpreters with the PC. Cassette Basic, Disk Basic and BASIC Advanced. Cassette BASIC was contained in a 32k ROM. Disk BASIC depended upon cassette basic but added support for floppies and a few other features. It required the cassette basic rom to be present. It was meant for machines with low memory and was launched via basic.com. Once all PCs shipped with more memory by default basic.com became just a launcher for BASICA for batch file compatibility. BASIC Advanced (BASICA) also required the presence of the cassette BASIC ROM. It added additional features above disk BASIC but required more memory. It was originally launched via basica.com. This eventually changed to basica.exe. At this time basica.com became just a launcher of basica.exe. Non-IBM versions of MS-DOS, at least the versions targeted for PC clones, shipped with basic.com and basica.com being launchers for basica.exe. This is true at least as far back as Compaq DOS 1.10. Earlier versions of MS-DOS were branded by OEMs and included versions of GW-BASIC which didn’t make direct reference to GW-BASIC such as the Compaq example you gave. I have a Zenith Z-161 luggable in my collection and the Zenith version of MS-DOS it runs has a BASIC which is gw -basic but reports itself Zenith BASIC and simply includes Microsoft in the copyright notice.