"GFA BASIC is Dead. Long Live GFA BASIC!" by Troy H. Cheek on Nov 10, 2008
Back about 1985, a fellow named Frank Ostrowski developed Turbo BASIC XL for the Atari 8-bit computers. In addition to runnning most Atari BASIC programs without modification, it was much faster, even interpreted. The compiler made it even better. Not content to rest on his laurels, Frank went on to create the first version of GFA BASIC for the Atari ST line of computers the very next year. This was great, because the ST BASIC included with the Atari ST sucked even compared to the old 8-bit included BASIC. By the time I bought my first Atari ST, he was up to version 3.5 or so and GFA BASIC was pretty darn sharp. I bought it by default (being the only programming language that store was selling at that time) without even realizing it was developed by the same guy who brought us Turbo BASIC XL. I started programming in Atari ST GFA BASIC and, in a very real sense, I never really stopped.
If I ever meet Frank Ostrowski, I owe him ein Bier.
However, even the 3.6TT upgrade which made GFA BASIC run better on the Atari TT030 (which I never owned) and the Falcon030 (which I did) couldn't really help, because Atari stopped making computers, and nobody really wanted to write programs for computers you couldn't buy anymore. Even I eventually stopped using my Atari computers, though only after I'd checked out a few Atari ST emulators to make sure they could run my favorite ST programs, including the GFA BASIC interpreter and compiler. Especially the GFA BASIC interpreter and compiler.
Most of the programming I've done over the years for various Windows-based computers has been in GFA BASIC running on an emulator. I'm not exactly proud of that fact, but it's the truth. My friends, if I had any, would say I was fossilized. Maybe so, but I had a programming language that I was good at, comfortable with, and met my needs. Too bad it wasn't available for any other platform.
Years later, I found out that GFA BASIC was available in the following packages:
Come to think of it, I do vaguely recall hearing something about a GFA BASIC for Windows back around the 3.X days, but I also recall hearing that it wasn't worth the money and was GFA BASIC in name only. I never got a chance to try it out, so it slipped right out of my mind.
Until just the other day.
Taking jibes about fossilization to heart, I started thinking about learning a new language. I wanted something with an interpreter so I could change things on the fly, a compiler so I could run my finished programs straight from the Windows desktop, and at least a modicum of future-proofing. I wanted to use this language for the next twenty years. On the other hand, I didn't want to throw out everything I knew about programming. I knew Fortran, GFA BASIC, Pascal, and C.
I heard about ISO Full BASIC, which is apparently BASIC for the next century or something, with all the ease of use of BASIC and all the power of a modern programming language. However, it seems that such a thing doesn't really exist just yet. The closest I found to a complete package was Decimal BASIC. This BASIC was rather nice, though I couldn't find the compiler. I'm sure I saw one mentioned somewhere while I was reading about it, but then just couldn't find it when I started downloading. I like Decimal BASIC, and I definitely plan to use those graphing and plotting routines the next time I'm trying to explain a math problem to one of the nephews, but it wasn't what I was looking for.
What I really wanted was something that was very much like GFA BASIC but could create programs that would run under a modern Windows operating system. Do you know what you get when you type "GFA BASIC Windows 32 bit operating system" into a search engine?
Well, maybe such a thing exists, but it can't possibly still supported...
"December 2007 Upgrade"
Well, even if they have updated it recently, it probably costs too much...
"Use GFA-BASIC 32 freely now!"
Well, I'll eventually have to give up Windows 2000 and XP, and since GFA BASIC won't work with Vista...
"Vista ready"
Well, I'll download it, but I hate trying to read German...
"English Helpfile is available now!"
Well, the new editor couldn't possibly be as easy to use as the old one... Oh, who am I kidding? I'm hooked.
Admittedly, I've got to learn a whole bunch of GUI manipulation before I can do any serious programming. GFA BASIC on the Atari ST gave you the option of creating bastardized half-GEM programs that looked ugly and didn't multitask nicely but were quick and easy to slap together. If you want something that behaves under Windows, you have to follow the rules. GFA-BASIC 32 for Windows has pretty much the same GUI (graphical user interface - windows, menu bars, dialog boxes, etc) commands as the ST GEM (graphic environmental manager - windows, menu bars, dialog boxes, etc) commands. At least in spirit. I can't tell you about the particulars because I pretty much ignored all that when I was slapping together my bastardized programs. In fact, most of my programs just used a TOS window for input and output, what Windows users would call the command prompt or console. I supposed I might as well learn to do it right this time.
The main thing bothering me so far is that under GFA BASIC 32 (version 2.3!) for Windows, I have to actually declare my variables before I use them. That's going to require a lot more forethought than I'm used to when programming. Still, it beats learning a whole new programming language.
If you don't hear from me next week, I've probably programmed myself to death.
