Chinese BASIC is the name given to several Chinese

Chinese language

The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...

-localized versions of the BASIC programming language in the early 1980s.

Versions

At least two versions of Chinese BASIC were modified Applesoft BASIC

Applesoft BASIC

Applesoft BASIC was a dialect of Microsoft BASIC supplied with the Apple II series of computers. It superseded Integer BASIC and was the BASIC in ROM in all Apple II series computers after the original Apple II model. It was also referred to as FP because of the command used to invoke it instead...

 that accepted Chinese commands and variables. They were built into some Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

-made Apple II

Apple II

The Apple II is an 8-bit home computer, one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products, designed primarily by Steve Wozniak, manufactured by Apple Computer and introduced in 1977...

 clones. One of these was shipped with the best-selling Multitech Microprofessor II

Microprofessor II

Microprofessor II , introduced in 1982, was Acer's second branded computer product and also one of the earliest Apple clones. It does not look like most other computers...

 (known as Acer

Acer (company)

Acer Incorporated is a multinational information technology and electronics corporation headquartered in Xizhi, New Taipei City, Taiwan. Acer's products include desktop and laptop PCs, tablet computers, servers, storage devices, displays, smartphones and peripherals...

 today). Another version was shipped with MiTAC's Little Intelligent Computer (小神通) http://www.apple2clones.com/?q=image/tid/91.

In addition to Apple II clones, Multitech also developed a Zilog Z80

Zilog Z80

The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

-based port of the Chinese BASIC for its own line of high-end computers.

Example

In a typical Chinese BASIC environment, Chinese and English commands are interchangeable. It may also accept Chinese and Latin alphabet

Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most recognized alphabet used in the world today. It evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, which was adopted and modified by the Etruscans who ruled early Rome...

 variables. For example you may use PRINT A in line 50, 印 A in line 200 and ? A in line 250. They all do the same thing -- to print out the value of A on screen.

Chinese BASIC commands are printed in blue		Applesoft BASIC
10 卜=0		10 Y=0
20 入 水, 火		20 INPUT E, F
30 從 日 = 水 到 火		30 FOR A = E TO F
40 卜 = 卜+對數(日)		40 Y = Y + LOG (A)
50 下一 日		50 NEXT A
60 印 卜		60 PRINT Y

This program calculates the sum of log (E) + log (E+1) + log (E+2) + ... + log (F). The Chinese characters used as variables

Variable (programming)

In computer programming, a variable is a symbolic name given to some known or unknown quantity or information, for the purpose of allowing the name to be used independently of the information it represents...

 are the 24 radicals of the Cangjie method

Cangjie method

The Cangjie input method is a system by which Chinese characters may be entered into a computer by means of a standard keyboard...

, one of the earliest QWERTY

QWERTY

QWERTY is the most common modern-day keyboard layout. The name comes from the first six letters appearing in the topleft letter row of the keyboard, read left to right: Q-W-E-R-T-Y. The QWERTY design is based on a layout created for the Sholes and Glidden typewriter and sold to Remington in the...

 keyboard-compatible Chinese input methods

Chinese input methods for computers

Hundreds of Chinese input methods are available for entry of Chinese characters into computers, but most keyboard-based methods rely on either pinyin phonetic readings or root shapes in Chinese characters...

. The author of the example program may have been Chu Bong-Foo

Chu Bong-Foo

Chu Bong-Foo is the inventor of the Cangjie method, the most widely available Chinese input method. He is said to be the father of the modern Chinese computing, as his public domain input method, created in 1976, has sped up the computerization of Chinese society.Chu spent his childhood in Taiwan,...

 , the inventor of the Cangjie method and one of the founding fathers of modern Chinese computing.

The length of an Applesoft BASIC variable name is restricted to two byte

Byte

The byte is a unit of digital information in computing and telecommunications that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, a byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the basic addressable element in many computer...

s. Therefore, the variables THISNUMBER and THATNUMBER are treated in the same way. In Multitech's Chinese BASIC, a variable can be 3 bytes long (one Chinese character + one numeral).

External links

• A page of the Chinese BASIC manual (in traditional Chinese)
• RoboMind: educational programming language in Chinese