Talk:Atari BASIC

message: I've added the removed section and included a ref. for discussion. It would be most helpful to show sources and data to allow this section to stand without dispute. An example would be college curriculum or other training that makes use of the Atari BASIC source code. --Pelladon 21:54, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If you have sources, I have no problems with that. I was only putting in info that was verifiable and sourced. I have a lot of info that I cannot include because I can't source it. That's how things work. --Pelladon 21:43, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Do keep in mind, Wikipedia does not condone original research - Wikipedia:No original research --Pelladon 22:22, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: As long as it's not original research. Best to use a referenced source (original articles and documentation, for example). --Pelladon 19:14, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Just read this, use it as a guideline, okay? - Wikipedia:No original research. Before you do anything, show the sources so everyone can take a look first. --Pelladon 03:21, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Don't make such a big deal out this, just show the sources first and then  take it from there. --Pelladon 15:04, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Put it in the Atari BASIC discussion page, not on the main page itself. --Pelladon 15:21, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: By putting it in the discussion page, this allows others to look at it and give suggestions. Part of the process. Please put the discussions on the appropriate page, not on my home page. Thanks. --Pelladon 15:34, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: No, it's asking others how to proceed with this. BTW: You still haven't shown anything (source, info) to debate about. --Pelladon 15:57, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: This is your last warning. Any discussions of Atari BASIC needs to go to the Atari BASIC discussion page, not my home page. --Pelladon 16:23, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Influence on other BASICs

message: I added a reference to this (webbed) book, which has a brief account of the development of Atari Basic. It conflicts somewhat with the article - for one thing, it says that Atari Basic was spec'ed for 10K, not 8K. Mirror Vax 01:48, 27 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It could have been Atari giving them (SMI) some leeway in size since Atari themselves were having problems fitting MS Basic into 8K. (Atari originally designed their system with 8K allocated to BASIC, before BASIC was developed). And they needed it fast. All moot of course. --Pelladon 17:05, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Inside Atari DOS

message: Might help to have a section describing the three versions, Revision A, B and C. Never mind :D --Pelladon
BTW: There's a line stating that Atari BASIC was patterned after Data General's BASIC. Is there any valid source for this info? Since when did Shepardson Microsystems get it inspiration from Data General? BASIC dialects were in the hundreds or more. Thanks. --Pelladon 03:08, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, there's a line saying that AB's strings were similar to those DGB, which is an obvious truism. They are also similar to C, for example. This whole article needs a massive re-write. Battling editors have managed to take what was essentially a pared-down version of my AB:GBU article and mangled it into an almost unreadable mess, while misleading the reader that the article is actually taken from other sources. Maury 20:01, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Oops, my bad, I see the reference you're talking about now. Oh well, all fixed now. Maury 21:50, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Versions 

message: There are some wrong informations in the article. I don't edit myself because my English is not very good:In Atari BASIC, "P." does not expand to "PRINT" as the article claims. It expands to "POINT". Probably because "PRINT" has already "?" as abbreviation. "PR." is not much longer anyway.The strings does not start at "location zero" as the article claims, but at location 1. So no compatibility problems are present because of that.Two dimensional arrays do exist in Atari BASIC. Although not for strings.Finally, "INPUT D:" will not input from disk, "INPUT #1" will, if I/O channel 1 is open for disk input.Cyco130 07:55, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Feel free to fix - I was going on many-years old memory there. Or would you like me to do these fixes? The string one is just wrong, the problem is at the "other end" when you're specifying lengths, like in MID$. Maury 13:14, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

text: You cannot access a Atari BASIC string variable with a zero subscript, you get a Error- 5 (string length error).—Pelladon 08:45, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wrong information 

message: "Six months and many man-hours later, they were almost ready. But Atari had a deadline with the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) approaching and decided to ask for help."
Is this accurate? I'm curious, because I have a direct statement (in e-mail) from Bill that their stuff was 12 k and showed no signs of getting any smaller when OSS was called in. The statement is part of a larger history so I can't be sure he's talking about the same point in time that the article is, but I don't believe it is inaccurate. Another point to consider is that although the machines were announced at the CES, they didn't ship for another year (almost). If the MS version was that close, I simply can't see them going to OSS just for the CES, when they would already know they had lots of time. And finally, I seem to recall the MS version in the PET being about the same size too.
*sigh* If only they connected the whole 16 k to the "left" cart, all of this would be moot.
Maury 16:05, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It was from Bill Wilkinson, Atari cut out a lot from MS Basic to get it to fit in 8K. They were better off going with Atari BASIC from Shepardson. 8KB is very limiting for any BASIC. Can't do much with 8KB.—Pelladon 08:42, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I'm referring to the timing. Bill was the one that told me it was still 12k when OSS got the contract. And seeing that the MS basic they did release was later (12k?) I'm somewhat skeptical about the history. Maury 13:31, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The only MS BASIC for the Atari was 27KB (disk and cart+extensions). —Pelladon 18:16, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

text: More confused than ever then! Bill definitely said it was 12k when they took over. Maury 23:28, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  MS basic issue 

message: I've never heard this term used to describe how Atari BASIC, or any other BASIC, functions. Source please? Clayhalliwell (talk) 15:51, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. I think it's called "immediate mode". Cyco130 (talk) 06:40, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: "Intermediate Mode"?

message: Is there a simple PEEK command or similar that will tell you which one of the three revisions, A, B, or C, you have in an Atari? Please add this info. -- 92.229.77.243 (talk) 13:27, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  How to find out what revision it is? 

message: This section has little to do with Atari BASIC. It's related to ANTIC and the Atari OS. The alternate character set is part of the XL/XE OS ROM, not Atari BASIC "C" ROM. — Pelladon (talk) 18:05, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, but as far as I know there is no article on the Atari 8-bit OS. The section on the CIO thus is longer than it need be, for the same reason. I don't know if we can sensibly make a case for a split-out when there is considerable interaction between the two yet not really enough stuff to support a separate article. SimonTrew (talk) 23:02, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, it really is a Atari OS topic and should be part of that. Until a separate Atari OS page is built, it can stay for now. — Pelladon (talk) 04:02, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Character Set 

message: Great job people writing this article!!! I used to program in Atari BASIC on an Atari 800 computer and this brings back memories. Thank you!--Tomwsulcer (talk) 15:05, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Great article 

message: Dear all, thanks a lot for this great article.
I was trying to gather a few Atari-related articles when I noticed that this one cannot be properly printed in PDF format anymore.
Print Export > Download as PDF
produces the following error message
WARNING: Article could not be rendered - ouputting plain text.
Potential causes of the problem are:
(a) a bug in the pdf-writer software
(b) problematic Mediawiki markup
(c) table is too wide
As a result, the page is unformatted, and all the text is printed in a single giant paragraph, without CR.
Can anyone figure out what's wrong in the formatting of the current version of the page (Aug 2011)?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ldelsarte (talk • contribs) 10:03, 20 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article cannot be properly printed as PDF anymore 

message: I deleted Atari hardware-specific topics that aren't tied to Atari BASIC.
Someone wrote this amazingly detailed personal essay about Atari BASIC at some point, but it wasn't encyclopedic in tone, and it also dwelled on exceptional cases and advanced topics that made the core information harder to follow. I tried to keep the spirit of the original while drastically reducing the bulk and the editorializing.
I rewrote most of the machine language subroutine section.
There's a lot more that can be done, but these changes reduced the size of the article by close to 30K.
Dgpop (talk) 02:04, 11 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Attempt at getting this back under control

message: Under "Releases", "It cannot be fixed by pressing the Reset key" - Reset here is stylized as a computer button, by putting double brackets and "keypress|". Later there are two s, The stylized ENTER is justified because it is presented along with code, and therefore clears up possible confusion with differently stylized letters. But there is extensive, and I think unnecessary use of code starting with "OPTION" in the second paragraph, which would easily be differentiated with capital letter alone. Ideally both the keypress font and the code font should only be used when there may be confusion, especially with commons words such as "print" which may be used the computer command print . It should not be used as "Revision B also contains a bug that adds 16 bytes to a program every time it is SAVEd and LOADed" SMH! There's so much of this article put into stylized "code", that I don't want to go through the article with a chainsaw and potentially pick fights with people who think each word is essential. Although my experience on Wikipedia has been that people forget their contributions, on articles which people tag with templates like "Importance and notability","Neutrality and factual accuracy", and "Verifiability and sources", which are also ignored for years and likewise forgotten. So, I'm going to change a couple of examples of "code" But I mostly want to tell future contributors, don't add to this mess! It may belong on other wikis, Atari ones particularly. But not Wikipedia.Tumacama (talk) 20:42, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
thread_title: "Reset" Key in Cutsey "font" {{keypress|Reset}}