BASIC (Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a programming language designed by John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz in 1964 and popularized by Microsoft in the 1970s. BASIC is good for programming simple calculations quickly, and you do not have to learn much of the language in order to begin using it. Because no declarations are required, programs can be quite short.
In the 1970s and 1980s, numerous software vendors, especially Microsoft, added features to BASIC to support STRUCTURED PROGRAMMING and a wide variety of DATASTRUCTURES. Today, BASIC is one of the most complex programming languages in wide use, incorporating features from Pascal, FORTRAN, and C. Line numbers are no longer necessary.
However, BASIC is still easy for beginners to use, and the newest BASIC compilers still accept programs written in Kemeny and Kurtz’s original language.
An example of a BASIC Program:
10 REM Temperature conversion program 20 PRINT ”Temperature in Fahrenheit”; 30 INPUT F 40 LET C=(F-32)*5/9 50 PRINT F;” F equals ”; 60 PRINT C;” C” 70 END
The output is:
Temperature in Fahrenheit? 98 98 F equals 36.66667 C