That's when mathematicians John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz successfully ran the first program written in their newly developed BASIC (Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code ...

Since the 1960s, BASIC has introduced countless beginners to computer programming. Here's how the language got started, the paths it cleared for Windows and Apple, and where you can still find it ...

We found 101 Games in BASIC, a book with code for making versions of checkers, Battleship, and the like. It was our Necronomicon. We’d heard about computer programming, of course, but never ...

Why Basic mattered. Chief among the mourners has been tech pundit and science fiction author David Brin, who decried Basic’s passing in a widely cited article, “Why Johnny Can’t Code ...

Today, most computer users don’t see raw BASIC code when they turn on their machines. ... Kemeny and Kurtz flipped the switch on the first BASIC program on May 1, 1964, at 4AM.

But BASIC also flourished in the West, thanks in part to the fact that super-successful microcomputers, which had proved to be a hit in schools, already came equipped with the programming language.

He argues that our schools need to incorporate computer programming into the core curriculum or get left behind. “It’s time Americans begin treating computer code the way we do the alphabet or ...

60 years ago, the inventors of the BASIC programming language actually achieved what they had hoped for: simple programming that is accessible to everyone. At 4:00 a.m. on May 1, 1964, the first ...

Altair Basic was developed by Gates, fellow Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and programmer Monte Davidoff. The trio reportedly coded “day and night for two months” in 1975.