A book to teach ANYBODY how to program a computer.

Click the PayPal Button to purchase an instant download of the complete (non-watermarked) Third Edition for $0.99 USD. Help support the development of this book.

The original vision for this book was to create a hands-on introduction of computer programming for Middle School and High School students. It has been written without much of the jargon and complexity of many programming books and will be suitable for anybody 10+ who wants to learn to program and is ready to experiment.

Programming a computer is considered by many to be a task that is beyond a typical middle grades learner. I personally know this is not so because, I learned to program my TRS-80 home computer during those years of my life. Programming was different: simpler in that we didn’t need to worry about hard disks, color, or graphics; and harder for the same reasons.

This book attempts to engage through programming media (sound, color, shapes, and text to speech) and then working in the typical concepts of programming (loops, conditions, variables…) to make animations, games, and fun applications. Full source code to example programs are given so that experimentation can really hone the skills learned.

The Third Edition has been updated through version 2.0.0.0 of BASIC-256 and includes functions, subroutines, printing, and many other new features.

James M. Reneau Ph.D

The download link is in the small pop-up after you pay. Be sure to save the PDF from your browser before you close out. If you missed it email me at jim@renejm.com and I will email you a copy.

Click on a chapter for full text and other resources, free!

6 thoughts on “So You Want to Learn to Program – BASIC-256 (Third Edition)”

  1. Wow! What a walk down memory lane. I was sharing with my boys how I would have been a better math student had I had a computer when I was in junior high school. We had Commodore PET 2001’s and even an Apple II+ once I got into high school. BASIC was the language we all used and games were our favourite. Of course, we had to write them to play them and shared all of our code!

    Thinking on those days I thought to see what I could find online to learn BASIC all over again…and teach my sons to program too. Low and behold I found you!

    Amazingly, I remembered enough BASIC to write a program on the first run of BASIC-256!

    Looking forward to learning what I really wanted to learn all those years ago.

    Thank you!

    Reply

  2. 09-04-2020
    Dear James M, Reneau

    His absolutely extraordinary Basic-256 programming book, especially the pedagogy used. I had already liked the table of contents; and indeed, the book is superb. Honestly, congratulations on the great service you provide to those of us who have chosen this programming language.

    I think that either I did something wrong, or I didn’t do what I should do. Let me explain: when making the payment of $ 0.99, the PC promp appeared on the table of contents of the book. At the end, there was all the content of the book. I was flipping through it. Some time later I turned off the computer.

    When trying to access the content of the book again, I find that I cannot. I click on the address “http://sy21.org/? Id = 407”, but the book does not appear, the promp keeps blinking indefinitely. I ask:
    1º) .- What do I have to do to access the book again?
    2º) .- What exactly I have to do to download it in PDF?
    Again, and from Spain, thank you very much for this magnificent book.

    Kind regards: Delfin

    Reply

    1. I have emailed you a copy. You should have saved the PDF from your browser once you download it. I will add that note to the page.

      Reply

  3. Sir,

    I wish to write a program in BASIC language for “tour of knight on chessboard” using backtracking.

    Please write a sample program using backtracking if it is possible to do so in BASIC.

    If it is not possible then improve the BASIC language accordingly.

    Warm regards,
    Awani Kumar

    Reply

    1. That should be very possible in BASIC256. Functions allow recursion. Set the board up as a two dimensional array. Store if the Knight has visited a cell.

      Reply

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