minibasic (McLean's)

A very simple, open-source BASIC interpreter implemented in ANSI C by Malcolm McLean, published on GitHub since January 2017.

In spite of the name and the authors initials, it has nothing to do with Joe Strout's MiniBASIC for the Mini Micro. Malcolm's design goals were also pretty different: console-only, portability, embeddability and easy learning¹⁾.

According to the author, his BASIC "is not really intended as a standalone program, except for teaching purposes". This is somewhat similar to the original purposes of "tool" or "glue" languages such as Lua and Tcl/Tk, and some tips on this usage of minibasic are there among its somewhat sparse documentation.

Where it is/was used

This is unclear. The repository contains no makefiles or tips on how to build and run minibasic.

Noteworthy characteristics

McLeans minibasic is a line-numbered, console-only BASIC interpreter.

Environment and usage

Extensions

Curiosities

Related to...

Influenced by

Influence for

Versions and successors

References

• https://malcolmmclean.github.io/minibasic/web/keywords.html
• https://malcolmmclean.github.io/minibasic/web/design.html