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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!lll-lcc!well!ewhac
From: ewhac@well.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Fish Disk #13 and AmigaBasic
Message-ID: <4649@well.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 6-Dec-87 17:45:14 EST
Article-I.D.: well.4649
Posted: Sun Dec  6 17:45:14 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 12-Dec-87 08:42:44 EST
References: <42600011@uicsrd>
Reply-To: ewhac@well.UUCP (Leo 'Bols Ewhac' Schwab)
Organization: Time Distortion Enterprises
Lines: 46
Summary: More history

In article <42600011@uicsrd> hoefling@uicsrd.csrd.uiuc.edu writes:
>I'm a new Amiga 500 owner and I'm having trouble getting AmigaBasic programs
>to work.  Specifically, I have gotten none of the *.bas files on Fish disk
>#13 to work.  According to my listing of PD disks, most of those files are
>written in AmigaBasic, yet all of the ones I have tried to run under 
>AmigaBasic run into "unknown keyword" type problems which seem to stem from
>the use of library routine names that are unknown to the interpreter.  [ ... ]
>
>Could these be references to old library routines that have been superseded
>by new ones with new names?   [ ... ]

	Have a bit more history:

SillyMode (ON);   /*  Yet again  */

	In the beginning, there was Kickstart 1.0.  It was riddled with a
multitude of bugs, and did cause consternation among the users.

	Bundled with the system software was the Extras Disk.  And upon this
disk was a BASIC interpreter.  This BASIC was created by MetaComCo, and it
was called ABasiC (I kid you not).  And this BASIC was, contrary to what
might be expected, good.

	But Commodore saw that 1.0 was crud, and sought to de-crudify it.
And C-A said, "Let there be 1.1"  And there was 1.1.  And Commodore saw that
it was good (well, it was better than 1.0, anyway).

	And Commodore did bundle with 1.1 a BASIC interpreter.  This BASIC
was created by MicroSoft, a company that has never produced a decent BASIC
interpreter in its entire corporate history.  And it was called AmigaBASIC.
And it was (and is) incompatible.  And Commodore saw that it was good.  And
the users saw it differently.  But the Newcomers did not know of the
history, and were satisfied.

SillyMode (OFF);

	The upshot of which is:  Fish Disk #13 contains ABasiC programs,
which won't work directly under AmigaBASIC.  If, however, you can locate a
veteran 1000 owner, you can probably get a copy of ABasiC.  Whether or not
it works under 1.2, I have no idea.

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Leo L. Schwab -- The Guy in The Cape	ihnp4!ptsfa -\
 \_ -_		Recumbent Bikes:	      dual ---> !{well,unicom}!ewhac
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