Sinclair BASIC is back – and can be run under Windows, Linux or on the Pandora handheld.
SpecBAS is a remake of Sinclair BASIC – it’s faster, far more powerful and more colourful than Sinclair BASIC has ever been!
SpecBAS incorporates all the features of Sinclair BASIC, but with more:
Procedures, with both referenced and normal variable parameters
Flow control with DO..LOOP, WHILE..LOOP, DO..UNTIL
Better array handling, with variable BASE settings and FOR..EACH support
Better string handling with LEFT$, RIGHT$, MID$, REPEAT$ etc
Memory banks which can be loaded, saved and utilised to hold a variety of data types
Many, many more maths functions, with both radians and degrees support
Graphics with 8bpp in any supported resolution with full palette changing, rotation, scaling etc
Sound support with MOD/S3M/XM/IT/MP3/VOC/WAV etc
Turtle graphics, sprites, tilemaps.
And it has less:
No more attribute clash
no 48k restriction
full disk access, so no tapes!
No more beeper 🙂
More information about SpecBAS can be seen on the following site : SpecBAS
Sorry, this is pretty much not Sinclair Basic. “Better string handling…” eh? Sinclair Basic had perfectly good String handling!!!!!
let s$ = Left$(e$, 1, 5)
let s$ = e$ (1 to 5)
WOW!! So, you’ve managed to remove the charm of the dialect and replace it with standard Microsoft style Basic. No thank you.
Left$/Right$ and Mid$ were added by popular demand. The older sinclair style is still available should you choose to use it 🙂
The original string handling method is retained, and is faster than the function based system. The LEFT$/RIGHT$/MID$ functions were lifted from BBC BASIC, not Microsoft, and added due to user demand. If people feel that the extra functions are detracting from their experience they can always feel free to just not use them…