Programming: QBASIC History Timeline

QBASIC, a programming language created by Microsoft, and software produced with it continue to be used today despite its long history, spanning more than two decades. An improvement upon previous implementations of the BASIC programming language, QBASIC was released in several versions before being replaced by Visual BASIC. This timeline also covers the history of QuickBASIC, an implementation of QBASIC with more features, which was sold separately from DOS and Windows.

QB HISTORY TIMELINE

1985-1987: QuickBASIC was originally released in 1985. According to microsoft.com, it was sold on a 5.25" floppy disk and wasn't available on 3.5" disks. Version 2.0 was released in 1986 on both 5.25" and 3.5" disks, having added the built-in user interface usually associated with QBASIC and QuickBASIC. Some relatively minor improvements were added to versions 2.01 and 3.0.

1988: QuickBASIC 4.5, the last version of QuickBASIC, became available. Microsoft's web site indicates that a few problems from version 4.0b were corrected and the Help system was greatly improved. From personal experience, 4.5 will work on any computer from an 8088 with DOS 2.11 to a Pentium IV with Windows XP, but works best on pre-XP operating systems.

1990: A repackaged QuickBASIC 4.5 was released, with a few changes. According to support.microsoft.com, the new packaging was smaller and less expensive to ship, and there were some minor changes to the product as well; three instruction manuals were combined into one, the files were compressed on to fewer disks, and a utility program for uncompressing them was added. Although they would become part of history in years to come, 5.25" floppy disks were still included, alongside 3.5" disks which have become the standard.

RECENT HISTORY

1991-1998: QBASIC, similar to QuickBASIC but without a compiler for creating executables, starts being included with DOS and Windows by Microsoft. According to wikipedia.org, QBASIC was included with MS-DOS 5.0 and later, as well as Windows 95, some versions of Windows NT, IBM PC-DOS, some OS/2 versions, and Windows 98.

2000: Microsoft stops including QBASIC with their operating systems. Wikipedia.org indicates that Windows 2000 and later systems do not come with QBASIC. Various programming languages which are mostly or partially based on QBASIC, such as FreeBASIC, are available on the internet.

AT PRESENT

Because it is relatively easy to learn and was included with a number of Microsoft operating systems, QBASIC remains popular as a first programming language to learn. The built-in QBASIC user interface makes it attractive in comparison to some other programming languages, as it is easy-to-use and works on just about any DOS or Windows computer. It is also still used for programming some freeware and shareware software programs. While it lacks the widespread use it had once attained, it is unlikely to be completely relegated to history for many years to come.