(Very few painters still grind their own pigments. Yes, they mostly use higher level languages now, stacking and organizing object-oriented services, or using other hifalutin processes that come prepackaged and ready to use, the way an artist uses pre-packaged paints. Most of these later innovations were brought to us by programmers who first honed their abilities with line-programming languages like BASIC. Oh, today's desktops and laptops offer plenty of other fancy things - a dizzying array of sophisticated services that grow more dazzling by the week. And that is not only a problem for Ben and me it is a problem for our nation and civilization.
#CHIPMUNK BASIC VERSION SOFTWARE#
Not even the one that was a software lingua franca on nearly all machines, only a decade or so ago. Only, quietly and without fanfare, or even any comment or notice by software pundits, we have drifted into a situation where almost none of the millions of personal computers in America offers a line-programming language simple enough for kids to pick up fast. Why on Earth would we want to do that, in an era of glossy animation-rendering engines, game-design ogres and sophisticated avatar worlds? Because if you want to give young students a grounding in how computers actually work, there's still nothing better than a little experience at line-by-line programming. For three years - ever since my son Ben was in fifth grade - he and I have engaged in a quixotic but determined quest: We've searched for a simple and straightforward way to get the introductory programming language BASIC to run on either my Mac or my PC.
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