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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!bellcore!decvax!ittvax!ittral!hall
From: hall@ittral.UUCP (Doug Hall)
Newsgroups: net.micro.68k,net.micro.6809
Subject: OS-9 and BASIC09 info wanted
Message-ID: <146@ittral.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 20-May-85 21:58:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: ittral.146
Posted: Mon May 20 21:58:43 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 23-May-85 03:30:45 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: ITT Telecom B&CC Eng. Group, Raleigh, NC
Lines: 43
Xref: watmath net.micro.68k:789 net.micro.6809:459


Well, I have about decided to purchase the UniQuad board from
Hazelwood. (You haven't heard about the UniQuad? It's a single board
68008 machine with a bunch of serial/parallel ports, a disk
controller, SASI interface, OS-9/68K, BASIC09, a word processor, and a
spreadsheet.) Anyway, I won't have the bucks for Microware's C
compiler for a while, so it looks like I'll be stuck with BASIC09.
From what I've read, this doesn't look too bad as far as BASIC-like
languages go - in fact, it goes a long way toward making BASIC a
decent language. (No, as it stands, BASIC is NOT a decent language,
and folks who use it eventually go blind and grow hair on their
palms.)  So here are some questions:

1) How fast does BASIC09 run?
Given that it compiles to some wierd pseudo code, I don't expect
blinding speed, but it's at least sort of compiled isn't it? Benchmark
results (same machine, please - let's not compare CoCo's and VAXen
here!) would be welcomed.

2) Can you write decent applications in BASIC09? Stuff that you wouldn't
be ashamed to sell?  Is there a royalty involved on the runtime
package. (I assume there has to be some form of runtime support since
it's interpreted.)

3) Is the intermediate code compatible across both OS-9 and OS-9/68k?
If I write a BASIC09 program under OS-9/68k, can I move the
intermediate code over and run it under OS-9 for the 6809? Or do I have
to move the source as well?

Thanks in advance for any info. I am becoming more and more interested
in OS-9 and am determined to get some sort of system up and running. I
have just about ruled out building my own due to the high cost
(~$1500) of porting OS-9/68k to a new machine. That's what Microware
charges for a "Port-Pak" allowing you to bring up OS-9 on a prototype
of a "one-of-a-kind" machine.

Doug Hall
ITT Telecom, Raleigh, NC
...ittvax!ittral!hall

** OS-9, OS-9/68k, and BASIC09 are trademarks of Microware and
Motorola, I think. UniQuad is a strange name, and is a trademark of
Hazelwood Computing. Just BASIC by itself is a crock.