5 ms·
The thing about Microsoft's BASIC suite was that it wasn't generally bad (it was their launching software, after all), it was just generic. So implementations f
by deaddodo 2y ago
The thing about Microsoft's BASIC suite was that it wasn't generally bad (it was their launching software, after all), it was just generic. So implementations for different platforms could vary in quality depending on necessary integrations.
Amiga BASIC, AppleSoft, and QBasic/QuickBasic were generally good. But the Macintosh version was a little less refined than MacBasic, by all accounts.
- hnlmorg 2y agoQBasic was as different to Microsoft BASIC as Visual Basic is different to QBasic. It doesn’t really make sense to lump them into the same group. As for Microsoft BASIC, I generally found it to be amongst the worst BASIC product on the market at that time.
- deaddodo 2y agoThey're lumped in the same group by measure of being from the same source and following mostly the same core dialect. What I (and is usually) referred to as "Microsoft BASIC", not a specific product: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_BASIC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_BASIC E.g.: > Applesoft BASIC is a dialect of Microsoft BASIC - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applesoft_BASIC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applesoft_BASIC > Type Microsoft BASIC - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_Basic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_Basic > Type Microsoft BASIC - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QuickBASIC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QuickBASIC The point wasn't that they are they same, in fact quite the opposite. So it would make sense that some variants (the Amiga variant, in this case) could be good while others are less well received.
- hnlmorg 2y agoI’m familiar with the different variants of Microsoft BASIC. What I’m saying is that QBasic isn’t the same product as what Microsoft sold to 3rd parties like Altar, Apple, Commodore and co. So it doesn’t really make sense to discuss QBasic in that context despite it technically still being a dialect of BASIC written by Microsoft.
- LocalH 2y agoAmiga BASIC was pretty bad. It was slow, generally shared similar types of restrictions to Macintosh MS BASIC, and it didn't work on future 68k CPUs. I wouldn't be surprised if, similarly to Z80 and 6502 MS BASIC, their 68k BASIC was built from a single codebase. There are just too many similarities.