Learning BASIC next year in Programming - what to expect?

[FFStudios]

Next year you have to take two computer courses (one is required, the other is of your choosing) so for my choice I picked programming because I figured it'd be a handy thing to learn. Looking the course up in my book of studies for next year, it explained how I would be using BASIC to program.

I am new to any type of programming (except for Wikipedia articles, haha) and I was wondering if/what the pros and cons were to using BASIC.

[Metanoia]

The pros are that you can easily learn the basics of programming.

Your chances of making anything that you or others actually find useful aren't that great, but don't let that bother you. I still look back fondly at the first code I ever wrote, which was in TrueBASIC. Without that, I never would have had a proper stepping stone toward anything cool

I think any BASIC variant should give you the prerequisite knowledge to start learning C# , Java, or C++ if you're really into it.

The downside is that I think you could just as easily learn Python or Lua, which can be more useful for real-world use

[backwardspy]

A second year I'm friends with at my college is using FreeBASIC, and he's written an entire battle engine, complete with 3D battle scenes. It runs at a pretty good speed as well.

He's also written some smaller, miscellaneous things like a fractal viewer, raytracer ETC

[Xeon06]

BASIC? That's pretty old and deprecated, unless it's some modern version like BlitzBasic or FreeBasic. Pros are it's easy and has an english-like syntax, cons are that once you want to move to another language the synytax will likely confuse you. There are generally two types of syntax in languages. Basic-Like, and C-Like. Most languages used today are C-Like.

[Darwin226]

I had no problem switching the syntax. I don't see why anyone would.
IF a=b THEN something END IF
compared to
if (a==b) { something }

Forgive me it the first syntax isn't correct, I'm a bit rusty.

[{ABK}AbbySciuto]

[QUOTE=Darwin226;21383371]I had no problem switching the syntax. I don't see why anyone would.
IF a=b THEN something END IF
compared to
if (a==b) { something }

Forgive me it the first syntax isn't correct, I'm a bit rusty.[/QUOTE]

It's pseudocode, so the syntax doesn't matter at all.

I used BASIC on a Sharp Calculator as a starting point, and moved into Python and VB.NET.

Ahh, BASIC...

[Pandamobile]

It's pretty basic.

[EdoI]

Great for beginners, but it's just an introduction to programming since it's outdated and not many things can be done with it.

[backwardspy]

[QUOTE=Pandamobile;21389845]It's pretty basic.[/QUOTE]
[img]http://www.facepunch.com/ads/rating/tick.png[/img]

[editline]09:37AM[/editline]

[QUOTE=EdoI;21390716]Great for beginners, but it's just an introduction to programming since it's outdated and not many things can be done with it.[/QUOTE]
I'll repeat myself
[quote]A second year I'm friends with at my college is using FreeBASIC, and he's written an entire battle engine, complete with 3D battle scenes. It runs at a pretty good speed as well.

He's also written some smaller, miscellaneous things like a fractal viewer, raytracer ETC[/quote]
You CAN do a fair amount with it, it's just not as fast (or as nice to use in a lot of people's opinions) as newer languages.

[neos300]

BlitzMax is probably the best form of BASIC out there. It's got OOP, pointers, all that shit while still retaing BASIC like syntax.
I still wouldn't use it that much though.

[Darwin226]

What about DarkBasic (I've seen some pretty advanced stuff), also there is MS SmallBasic.

[jA_cOp]

[QUOTE=Darwin226;21413304]What about DarkBasic (I've seen some pretty advanced stuff), also there is MS SmallBasic.[/QUOTE]

DarkBasic doesn't even support a fraction of the features BlitzMax does.

[voodooattack]

BASIC dialects (some modern flavours, at least) are OK for a beginner.

I find FreeBASIC to be the [u]best[/u] amongst them, an excellent playground that'll help you gradually move on to C/C++ later (if so you wish); you get to experiment with pointers, signed and unsigned types, calling conventions, and later inline assembly; everything C offers but with a friendly syntax and a ready-to-use sandbox for graphics.

Lots of schools use it for teaching AFAIK.

[Agent766]

[QUOTE=Darwin226;21413304]What about DarkBasic (I've seen some pretty advanced stuff), also there is MS SmallBasic.[/QUOTE]

I have DarkBASIC. It seemed horribly outdated back in 01 when I first got it.