[Info-vax] The Future of Programming Languages and Web browsers

[Richard B. Gilbert]

Tom Wade wrote:
> 
>> I've never been a BASIC fan.  Not enough typing for me, no pointers, 
>> not enough control over data structure layout, etc.  With all the 
>> better languages around, I just amazed folks are still trying to bolt 
>> stuff onto the side of BASIC.  Whatever floats your boat.
> 
> Wouldn't be my first choice either, but at least it uses standard VMS 
> string descriptors, is reasonably readable and doesn't suffer from the 
> fetish of case sensitivity, unlike a certain other popular spawn-of-unix 
> language that must be one of the ugliest things ever unleashed upon the 
> programming world.
> 
> There are far worse things than Basic out there.

Of course there are.  Don't forget that "BASIC" is an acronym for
Beginners Allpurpose Symbolic Instruction Code.  It's the right tool for 
some jobs!

BASIC has introduced a good many people to programming.  Some stopped 
there and some moved on.