[Info-vax] Some questions on software for VMS 7.3 VAX

[David Froble]

lists at openmailbox.org wrote:
> On Fri, 1 Jan 2016 12:23:52 +0100
> Johnny Billquist via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:
> 
>> On 2016-01-01 09:27, lists at openmailbox.org wrote:
>>> On Fri, 01 Jan 2016 01:10:24 -0500
>>> David Froble via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> lists at openmailbox.org wrote:
>>>>> Thanks for the info. I'm finding VMS altogether more pleasant to work
>>>>> on than Linux but I'm missing a few key pieces partly because I don't
>>>>> have real VMS hardware and partly because of lack of software I want.
>>>>>
>>>> Use Basic.  You'll like it better.  It's available.  What more could
>>>> you want?
>>> Fortran, Ada, and maybe Pascal are more to my liking. And especially
>>> assembler if I like the architecture and assembler implementation.
>>>
>>> I know you're a BASIC bigot and I can respect that. Especially in VMS
>>> where it seems it is an oustanding implementation. Plus the fact the
>>> VMS runtime is available to all languages- really a smart way to do
>>> things. But still, BASIC is not my kind of language.
>>>
>>> BTW is the BASIC on VAX/VMS a true compiler or is it interpreted?
>> It's a compiler.
>> Outside of VAX, you can't even run in immediate mode.
> 
> Thanks. BTW my question was not relative to VAX v. other VMS platforms. My
> experience with other BASICs was interpreted BASIC.
> 

If you would spend a bit of time with DEC's version of Basic on VMS, you would 
not even mention it in the same paragraph as some of the other implementations 
of Basic.  It is a compiled language with a very rich set of features.