Qbasic ??
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Qbasic ??
Well im taking Qbasic for 1 of my online schooling class's...so far ive only done 1 assignment so it seems a bit eh...but i was wondering if any of u know Qbasic and would mind helping me from time 2 time on it ? im interested in learning coding but i need sumthing 2 FORCE me 2learn it (heh..lazyness xD) but this is why im taking this class because it IS forcing me 2 learn it...but um any info on what Qbasic is, what its used for, ect would be very helpfull and i will be very thankfull for any help i get on this..thanks guys !
-Jokerzwild your friendly neighborhood Juggalo
-Jokerzwild your friendly neighborhood Juggalo
- Jokerzwild420
- Posts: 20
- Joined: Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:27 pm
QBasic was microsoft's version of basic around the win3.1 era.
I remember making some app that started system commands with it.
I made it say something like 'Failure reading drive C. Abort, Retry, or Continue', as soon as the app that it started quit.
Was funny when I started windows with it (win3.1) and then left it for my mum to switch off. :)
But yeah, there's not really that much you can easily do with it.
You can get keyboard input, you can print text on the screen, you can read files, and you can invoke other apps to do stuff. Apparently you can also interract with an x86 io bus. But that cannot be pretty. But it does give you access to the pc speaker if you know how to drive it. If you're hosted in windows (NT anyway), windows will prevent you from doing anything fun - like reading raw disk sectors.
It was replaced by visual basic. The syntax is mostly supported in VB6. VB7 can presumably convert from it. But VB is much more versatile, with a greater wealth of libraries.
You can make games with qbasic, so long as you can design those games to use only a text display. With io bus access you could poke the graphics card into using a VGA mode, but that's going to be too slow.
But yeah, other than hacking your machine, the commercial use of qbasic is making financial applications. Simple single-file line-based databases, etc which the creator has to code using text files - things which don't have many interactions with the rest of the system, and are not too performance dependant.
I remember making some app that started system commands with it.
I made it say something like 'Failure reading drive C. Abort, Retry, or Continue', as soon as the app that it started quit.
Was funny when I started windows with it (win3.1) and then left it for my mum to switch off. :)
But yeah, there's not really that much you can easily do with it.
You can get keyboard input, you can print text on the screen, you can read files, and you can invoke other apps to do stuff. Apparently you can also interract with an x86 io bus. But that cannot be pretty. But it does give you access to the pc speaker if you know how to drive it. If you're hosted in windows (NT anyway), windows will prevent you from doing anything fun - like reading raw disk sectors.
It was replaced by visual basic. The syntax is mostly supported in VB6. VB7 can presumably convert from it. But VB is much more versatile, with a greater wealth of libraries.
You can make games with qbasic, so long as you can design those games to use only a text display. With io bus access you could poke the graphics card into using a VGA mode, but that's going to be too slow.
But yeah, other than hacking your machine, the commercial use of qbasic is making financial applications. Simple single-file line-based databases, etc which the creator has to code using text files - things which don't have many interactions with the rest of the system, and are not too performance dependant.
- Spike
- Posts: 2892
- Joined: Fri Nov 05, 2004 3:12 am
- Location: UK
I've done many things in QBasic for Quake modding. it's a fun, easy, fast, and simple language. I even made a 3D quake .map viewer (not bsps) once. Good stuff but I haven't used it for years now.
-

Error - InsideQC Staff
- Posts: 865
- Joined: Fri Nov 05, 2004 5:15 am
- Location: VA, USA
Make your computer sing! (Only on DOS6.2)
CLS
INPUT "HOW MANY DRUNKEN SOLDIERS"; MUSIC
FOR I = 1 TO MUSIC
PLAY Muziek$
PLAY "MB T160"
PLAY "L4 E L8 E. L16 D L4 C."
PLAY "< L8 G > C. L16 D"
PLAY "L8 E F"
PLAY "L4 E D"
PLAY "L4 D L8 D. L16 D L4 D. "
PLAY "L8 D D P32 L16 E L8 P32 F L8 G P32 A G F E "
PLAY "L4 C P32 L8 C P32 L16 C"
PLAY "L16 C P32 <B P32 A P32 L8 G P32"
PLAY "L8 G >C L16 D E. L4 F E L4 D C. P4"
NEXT
END
CLS
INPUT "HOW MANY DRUNKEN SOLDIERS"; MUSIC
FOR I = 1 TO MUSIC
PLAY Muziek$
PLAY "MB T160"
PLAY "L4 E L8 E. L16 D L4 C."
PLAY "< L8 G > C. L16 D"
PLAY "L8 E F"
PLAY "L4 E D"
PLAY "L4 D L8 D. L16 D L4 D. "
PLAY "L8 D D P32 L16 E L8 P32 F L8 G P32 A G F E "
PLAY "L4 C P32 L8 C P32 L16 C"
PLAY "L16 C P32 <B P32 A P32 L8 G P32"
PLAY "L8 G >C L16 D E. L4 F E L4 D C. P4"
NEXT
END
-

Madfox - Posts: 106
- Joined: Sat Jan 15, 2005 3:13 pm
- Location: Holland
I'm pretty sure I've seen loads of games with elaborate 2D graphics written in Qbasic. I made a bouncing ball screensaver with it a long time ago. Or is there possibly a difference between Qbasic and QuickBasic?
I was once a Quake modder
-

Urre - Posts: 1109
- Joined: Fri Nov 05, 2004 2:36 am
- Location: Moon
nice
..i droped the class though because i asked my teacher if qbasic could be used in ANYWAY for coding in quake and she said no it wouldnt even help me begin 2 understand quakes coding language..so i laughed and told her 2 drop me from the class =/...gah...regrets >.<..but o well im slowly gona be teaching myself how 2 code over the next months..havent started yet tho cuz B-day is tuesday :] so knockin that out the way then ima look at few tutorials n get crackin on learnin it...should be fairly easy 2 learn since i can have Ceriux help me out a bit with the easy stuff......n isnt qbasic just like a updated version of quickbasic ? thats what i was told atleast, not 2 sure though
- Jokerzwild420
- Posts: 20
- Joined: Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:27 pm
QBASIC isn't a useful programming language for actually coding anything really, but it is useful for learning the basics of programming. BASIC (Beginners All Symbolic Instructional Code) was designed as a language for teaching programming, so is a good language for learning the basics (pun intended), even if it isn't directly useful.
Apathy Now!
-

MauveBib - Posts: 634
- Joined: Thu Nov 04, 2004 1:22 am
no i know it isnt very useful but i got the class so it would help me be able to understand coding and help me be able to pick up on a different coding languages...but my teacher told me that it wouldn't help =/...she recommended this other class i can take for coding called python ?..do you think it would be worth my time ?
- Jokerzwild420
- Posts: 20
- Joined: Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:27 pm
python is like basic a script based language alltho a bit more powerfull. you still need the python runtime installed to actually run stuff compiled with it.
as for usability for games hmm probably possible not sure about speed.
has lots of usefull tools tho
as for usability for games hmm probably possible not sure about speed.
has lots of usefull tools tho
-

revelator - Posts: 2567
- Joined: Thu Jan 24, 2008 12:04 pm
- Location: inside tha debugger
Python is very powerful and you can make games with it just fine.
Improve Quaddicted, send me a pull request: https://github.com/SpiritQuaddicted/Quaddicted-reviews
- Spirit
- Posts: 1031
- Joined: Sat Nov 20, 2004 9:00 pm
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