Talk:BASIC interpreter

The article is missing the following, at the least:

History
- Discussion of the earliest BASIC interpreters, which were written for minicomputers
- Coverage of BASIC-PLUS, the first BASIC interpreter - that article itself needs updated, is it refers to tokenization for PPCODE, which actually an intermediate representation of a virtual machine
- Data General Business Basic
Discussion of two interpreters that predated Altair BASIC:
- One a government-funded project, programmed on a minicomputer for an 8008
- SCELBAL, for the 8008
- Update History of operating systems to reflect on BASIC's role as system
- Add reference to Randall Hyde
Development
- Language design
  - The ANSI standardization of BASIC
  - Support for computed GOTO, in Integer BASIC as well as Tiny BASIC (e.g., GOTO 100*X instead of ON X GOTO 100, 200, 300)
  - Add note about new graphic commands, perhaps starting with Level I
  - maps
  - PEEK/POKE, USR()
  - Add to language design contrast of DEC vs HP Time-Shared BASIC, from that article; add to string handling a reference back to the discussion there
  - Comparison of most common BASIC keywords
- Coding
- Virtual machines
  - Extend virtual machine discussion to include on PPCODE
- Architecture
  - Add a useful diagram summarizing the typical architecture of a BASIC interpreter
  - of interpreters
Program editing and storage
Variables and data types
- Discussion of switch from Integer BASIC because of floating point and Woz working on the floppy disk drive
Execution
Bibliography
- Update bibliography; add Further Reading with annotated source for PATB, Altair, Atari BASIC, and Integer BASIC
- List annotated source code for Further Reading:
  - Pittman's
  - PATB
  - Atari BASIC
  - SCELBAL
  - Altair BASIC annotated
  - Integer BASIC
Keep Size guidelines in mind

Done:

Added table contrasting extent of tokenization
TI GPL virtual machine

Jeffrey Henning (talk) 16:30, 2 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]