BASIC (an acronym for Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code)[1] is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages whose design philosophy emphasizes ease of use.

In 1964, John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz designed the original BASIC language at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. They wanted to enable students in fields other than science and mathematics to use computers. At the time, nearly all use of computers required writing custom software, which was something only scientists and mathematicians tended to learn.

Versions of BASIC became widespread on microcomputers in the mid-1970s and 1980s. Microcomputers usually shipped with BASIC, often in the machine's firmware. Having an easy-to-learn language on these early personal computers allowed small business owners, professionals, hobbyists, and consultants to develop custom software on computers they could afford.

BASIC remains popular in many dialects and in new languages influenced by BASIC, such as Microsoft's Visual Basic. In 2006, 59% of developers for the .NET Framework used Visual Basic .NET as their only programming language.[2]

History

Before the mid-1960s, the only computers were mainframes. Users submitted jobs on punched cards or similar media to computer operators. The computer stored these, then used a batch processing system to run this queue of jobs one after another - allowing very high levels of utilization of these expensive machines. As the performance of computing hardware rose through the 1960s, multi-processing was developed. This allowed a mix of batch jobs to be run together, but the real revolution was the development of time-sharing.

Time-sharing allowed multiple remote interactive users to share use of the computer, interacting with the computer from terminals with keyboards and teletype printers, and later display screens, in much the same way as desktop computers or personal computers would be used later.

Origin

Main article: Dartmouth BASIC
The original BASIC language was designed on May 1, 1964 by John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz[3] and implemented by a team of Dartmouth College students under their direction. The acronym BASIC comes from the name of an unpublished paper by Thomas Kurtz.[4] BASIC was designed to allow students to write mainframe computer programs for the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System. It was intended specifically for less technical users who did not have or want the mathematical background previously expected. Being able to use a computer to support teaching and research was quite novel at the time.

The language was based on FORTRAN II, with some influences from ALGOL 60 and with additions to make it suitable for timesharing. Initially, BASIC concentrated on supporting straightforward mathematical work, with matrix arithmetic support from its initial implementation as a batch language, and character string functionality being added by 1965.