Beside REM Extended BASIC uses the apostrophe for comments, what was the earliest reference?
TI Extended BASIC uses the exclamation mark, is there any standard?
2 Answers
The apostrophe as a comment marker appeared in Dartmouth BASIC v4 of 1968.
See page 52 (original page numbering) of reference.
Tymshare SUPER BASIC of the same year introduced !. I was unaware anyone else had used it.
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2If the main thrust of the question is "what was the earliest..." then this is surely the answer.dave– dave2024-08-20 18:57:16 +00:00Commented Aug 20, 2024 at 18:57
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2DEC BASIC-PLUS for the PDP-11 and DG's Extended BASIC for the Nova both allowed
!remark statements. Much later, Frank Ostrowski's GFA BASIC for the Atari ST also allowed this style of comment. The editor may have replaced blank lines with exclamation marks, as blank lines weren't allowed in GFA BASIC.scruss– scruss2024-08-20 21:05:40 +00:00Commented Aug 20, 2024 at 21:05 -
Sure, but RSTS-11 was a 1970s OS, so not the earliest example.dave– dave2024-08-20 21:40:44 +00:00Commented Aug 20, 2024 at 21:40
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+1 I just checked my hardcopy of the previous (1 January 1966) version of this manual, and, sure enough, "REM" is documented, but not the apostrophe. FWIW, the very first ever BASIC program ran on May 1, 1964. Search YouTube for "The Birth of BASIC" to learn the history from many of the people who were there.Ron– Ron2024-08-21 01:55:00 +00:00Commented Aug 21, 2024 at 1:55
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@dave - I was mostly responding to Maury's "I was unaware anyone else had used it."scruss– scruss2024-08-21 15:54:42 +00:00Commented Aug 21, 2024 at 15:54
Is there a standard? Yes, there are two.
ANSI X3.60-1978, also ECMA-55, Minimal BASIC, allows only REM. REM of course is a statement in its own right.
ANSI X3.113-1987 also ECMA-116, Full BASIC, not commonly implemented, allows REM and '!'. The latter is a 'tail comment', allowed on the same physical line as other statements.
Any other remark indicators are implementation-specific extensions to the standardized language(s).
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1The ANSI/ECMA standards may have been attempts at a de jure standard, but the Minimal BASIC standard was a little too minimal and a little too late to set standard usage. ANSI Full BASIC was entirely irrelevant by the time the standard came out. Demonstrating Minimal BASIC compatibility was helpful to show (US) Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) compliance, however, and Microsoft BASIC-80 claimed it was compliant in its manualscruss– scruss2024-08-20 21:13:37 +00:00Commented Aug 20, 2024 at 21:13
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3Nevertheless, a standard is a standard, even if it is ratified in the forest when no-one is around to hear it fall.dave– dave2024-08-20 21:38:32 +00:00Commented Aug 20, 2024 at 21:38
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Relevant links: ecma-international.org/publications-and-standards/standards/… and ecma-international.org/publications-and-standards/standards/…Giacomo Catenazzi– Giacomo Catenazzi2024-08-21 08:55:16 +00:00Commented Aug 21, 2024 at 8:55
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3"Any other remark indicators are implementation-specific extensions to the standardized language(s)." At least to me it seems pretty silly to call something an extension to a standard, when (in the vast majority of cases) the standard didn't exist yet when the "extension" was written.Jerry Coffin– Jerry Coffin2024-08-21 15:15:46 +00:00Commented Aug 21, 2024 at 15:15
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Fair enough. But then most of them were extensions to BASIC as defined by its inventors.dave– dave2024-08-21 22:58:52 +00:00Commented Aug 21, 2024 at 22:58
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