Retrocomputing Basic Implementations

Here is a summary of a number of Basic implementations that I have come across and worked with as part of my retrocomputing hobby. Many of these were ported by me or others to different platforms from the ones they were originally written for (for example, single board computers based on the 6502, 6809, Z80, and 68000 microprocessors). These are all found on my github  account.

Name	Developer	Platform	Code size	Comments
Enhanced Basic (68000)	Lee Davison	68000	14K	Full-featured Basic for 68K platform
Tiny Basic for the 68000	Gordon Brandly	68000	4K	Derived from and similar to Palo Alto Tiny Basic.
Enhanced Basic (6502)	Lee Davison	6502	11K	Full-featured Basic for 6502 platform.
Microsoft Basic for 6502	Microsoft	Apple 2, Commodore, KIM-1, OSI, and others	8K	Basic used on several early 6502-based microcomputers.
Tiny Basic for 6502	Tom Pitman	6502	3K	Originally published in Dr. Dobbs Journal.
Apple 1 Basic	Steve Wozniak	6502 (Apple 1)	4K	Basic for the Apple 1, later expanded into Apple 2 Integer Basic.
BBC Basic 2 for Acorn Atom/BBC Computer	Roger Wilson (Acorn Computer)	6502-based Acorn Atom and BBC Computers	16K	Basic for the Acorn Atom and BBC Computers.
Tiny Basic for 6800	Tom Pitman	6800	2K	My version runs on the Heathkit ETA-3400.
Tiny Basic for 6809	Tom Pitman	6809	2K	6809 port of 6800 version.
TSC Micro BASIC PLUS	Technical Systems Consultants	6809	4K	Similar to Tiny Basic.
Sinclair ZX81 Basic	John Grant and Steve Vickers, Nine Tiles Networks and Sinclair Research	Sinclair ZX80/ZX81, Timex 1000	8K	Basic for the Sinclair ZX81 computer.

Running Microsoft Basic 5 on CP/M

I recently posted a series of YouTube videos on the Briel Altair 800 kit, the most recent instalment being The Briel Altair 8800 Kit, Part 5: Advanced Topics  which I posted yesterday.

To supplement what I demonstrated there, I'm going to post more details and the files I used, to make it easier for others who want to try out the relevant software.

First, Microsoft BASIC.

Version 5.21 of Microsoft BASIC-80 dated 28-Jul-81 is included on the Briel Altair CD in the CP/M 3 disk image (CPM302GN.DSK) as the file MBASIC.COM. It will also run on CP/M version 2.2.

The Microsoft BASIC-80 ver 5.0 Reference Manual can be found on the Internet here.

Many of the programs from the David Ahl Creative Computing books on computer games can be found on the Briel Altair CD in the directory BASIC Software/creative computing.

Here is the source listing for the memory dump program I demonstrated. I wrote it quickly to demonstrate some of the BASIC-80 features like displaying numbers in hexadecimal.

100 REM Dump memory in hex and ASCII.
110 A = &H100 : REM Start address
120 A$ = "000" + HEX$(A)
130 A$ = RIGHT$(A$,4) 
140 PRINT A$;": ";
150 FOR I = 0 TO 15
160 S$ = "0" +HEX$(PEEK(A+I))
170 S$ = RIGHT$(S$,2)
180 PRINT S$;" ";
190 NEXT I
200 FOR I = 0 TO 15
210 IF PEEK(A+I) >= 32 AND PEEK(A+I) <= 126 THEN PRINT CHR$(PEEK(A+I)); ELSE PRINT".";
220 NEXT I
230 PRINT
240 A = A +16
250 GOTO 120