PowerBASIC

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PowerBASIC is a BASIC - compiler of the company PowerBASIC Inc. , of which various versions for MS-DOS and Windows are available. The development tools include an editor, the actual compiler and a debugger .

Current versions (End of 2008)
system program version
Windows PowerBASIC for Windows 04/100
PowerBASIC Console Compiler 6.040
PowerBASIC Forms 2.010
DOS PB / DOS 3.500

The compilers generate comparatively fast code that they generate in machine language, whereas some other BASIC compilers generate P-code that still has to be interpreted at runtime and only then is translated into machine language instruction by instruction. The files that the PowerBASIC compilers generate can run independently and do not require any runtime modules.

The PowerBASIC compilers are commercial programs. Only a very limited test version of the DOS compiler, version 3.20, is available free of charge, in which the loading of programs is prevented.

PowerBASIC for DOS

PowerBASIC for DOS
Paradigms : imperative , procedural
Publishing year: 1990
Developer: Bob Zale († November 6, 2012)
Current  version : 3.5   (1997)
Influenced by: Borland's TurboBasic, QBasic , Turbo Pascal , C
Affected: PB / DLL, PB / CC, PB / Win
Operating system : DOS
License : Commercially
powerbasic.com/products/pbdos/

The compiler originally came from Robert S. Zale (aka. Bob Zale), who left the marketing to the Borland company . In 1986 the program appeared as a TurboBASIC compiler. Similar to Turbo Pascal , it already supported structured programming. The scope of the language was based on Microsoft's QuickBASIC , so that PowerBASIC for DOS is largely compatible with QuickBASIC or QBasic . After only minor changes to the source code, you can therefore also compile QBasic code with PowerBASIC for DOS. With the appearance of Microsoft's QuickBasic and the free interpreter QBasic, Borland saw no more market opportunities and gave up the project.

In 1989, Bob Zale dissolved the existing distribution agreement with Borland, so that the Turbo brand had to be replaced and the new name PowerBASIC was created. With the company Spectra Publishing he found a new partner for worldwide sales. Since then, Bob Zale has continuously expanded the scope of the PowerBASIC language and has even built the Pointer and Union constructs known from the C programming language into PowerBASIC.

When Spectra Publishing went bankrupt in 1993, Bob Zale founded his own company in Carmel-by-the-Sea , California, called "PowerBASIC, Inc." whose headquarters are now in Englewood , Florida.

Surface PowerBASIC v.2.10f

Until the early 1990s, PowerBASIC had another significant disadvantage compared to QuickBasic. There was an integrated development environment (IDE) with pull-down menus , but no mouse support. This was only available from 1992 with the PowerBASIC version 3.0. In programs created in this way, mouse operation could only be integrated with some effort, either via interrupt calls or via PowerTOOLS, a third-party product that was only part of the PowerBASIC package in Germany for a certain time.

The last version of PowerBASIC for DOS 3.50 is only available in English. Today PowerBASIC represents a sector of program development for DOS that has been less and less in demand since the mid-1990s, especially due to the triumphant advance of graphical user interfaces, and which is now limited to a few specialized applications apart from the mass market. At the same time, PowerBASIC for DOS can also be used largely without problems under Windows, on the one hand under "real" Microsoft DOS 7.1 (as was the basis for Microsoft Windows 98 ), on the other hand in the DOS emulations of the newer Windows versions from Windows 2000 onwards . Due to its low memory requirements and its independence from the Windows registry, PowerBASIC for DOS is particularly suitable for portable use, e.g. B. for repair purposes from a USB stick. The only major obstacle here is that PowerBASIC for DOS only knows how to deal with 8.3 file names, so you may first have to use the command to determine dir "Langname" /xthe current 8.3 equivalent of the file name of the file to be processed, before it is opened with PowerBASIC for DOS and can be edited.

FirstBasic is based on PowerBASIC for DOS 2.10 and is an inexpensive entry- level version that also includes a real compiler.

PowerBASIC for Windows

For several years the focus of the PowerBASIC development has been on the further development of the PowerBASIC compilers for 32-bit Windows. There are two PowerBASIC variants for Windows: PowerBASIC for Windows (abbreviated “PB / Win”; former name: PowerBASIC DLL, abbreviated “PB / DLL”) and PowerBASIC Console (abbreviated “PB / CC” = PowerBASIC Console Compiler).

PowerBASIC for Windows (PB / Win)

PowerBASIC for Windows
Paradigms : imperative , procedural
Publishing year: 1989
Developer: Bob Zale
Current  version : 10.04   ()
Influenced by: PowerBASIC for DOS, Turbo Pascal , C
Operating system : 32-bit Windows, 64-bit Windows
License : Commercially
powerbasic.com/products/pbdll32/

PB / Win , which was called PB / DLL until mid-2002 , is a modern, easy-to-learn programming language for Windows systems that can be used to program applications that have a graphical user interface (menus, dialog boxes, etc.). The PB / Win compiler generates programs that are executed directly by the processor; they do not require any prior interpretation. The compilation is not an intermediate code, but native code can therefore Pb / win very fast and small EXE files produce, which also, if, alone without any desired DLL - or OCX - runtime libraries can work. As of version 7.0, PB / Win enables macros , i. H. the definition of repeatable source program parts, in principle similar to what is known from the C programming language.

Pb / Win programs can directly access all Windows functions via the WINAPI.INC include file . Runtime libraries are not required for this. PB / Win also has a built-in 32-bit inline assembler .

In addition, PB / Win is suitable for creating very lean and fast run-time libraries (DLLs), which can also be accessed by any other programming language that works with standard DLLs - hence the old name PB / DLL . PB / DLL first appeared in 1996, initially as a 16-bit version for Windows 3.1x.

Example of a user interface created with PowerBASIC Forms 1.0 for the sample application " Interface Explorer (final) " to be compiled with Pb / Win

PB / Win has a very comfortable development environment (IDE) which, in addition to the compiler, includes an editor with color-coded language elements (syntax coloring), a debugger and a help function. The debugger offers a convenient trace function that enables all important data content and code addresses to be recorded while the program is running.

PowerBASIC Forms

With the PowerBASIC Forms program, which can be purchased separately , graphical user interfaces for PB / Win programs can be created quickly and relatively easily, namely via a GUI (graphical user interface). PowerBASIC-Forms generates the PowerBASIC code required for the desired user interface. PowerBASIC, Inc. enables software developers to create a graphical user interface for their PB / Win programs faster than before, without having to use Visual Basic or similar third-party products.

PowerBASIC Console (PB / CC)

PowerBASIC Console Compiler
Paradigms : imperative , procedural
Publishing year: 1989
Developer: Bob Zale
Current  version : 6.04   ()
Influenced by: PowerBASIC for DOS, Turbo Pascal , C
Operating system : 32-bit Windows, 64-bit Windows
License : Commercially
powerbasic.com/products/pbcc/

PB / CC, the PowerBASIC Console Compiler is intended for purely text-based applications or for batch processing and programs with almost no screen output; from version 4, however, the language also includes a whole set of graphic commands. In addition, there have been some libraries and add-ons for PB / CC for a long time, with the help of which it is possible to program graphically appealing applications or to access the Windows API ( Application Programming Interface ).

The programs created with PB / CC look like DOS programs, but they are 32-bit Windows programs with full access to all Windows system functions. For example, up to 2 GB of RAM can be addressed, long file names are possible and all devices supported by Windows via drivers such as printers , modems and networks (including the Internet ) can be addressed.

PB / CC is very fast and ideal for all applications that do not require a graphical user interface, for example for CGI programs (interactive web applications), commercial calculations, any mathematical calculations, database access, semi-automatic text filtering, more complex batch programs or related applications .

application

PB / Win and PB / CC are designed for the creation of business applications under Windows; they are less suitable for programming games and creating multimedia applications, which would not be possible without additional program libraries. Blitz Basic or PureBasic , both multi-platform capable (with their integrated DirectX interfaces) or DarkBASIC for Windows are better suited for game programming .

See also

Web links

Newsgroups

Chat

  • irc.pbhq.de - IRC server for PowerBASIC users and developers