[hacknews] basic

henry (09/29/82)

Several times, people using the BASIC interpreter (basic(1)) have run
into size limits of various kinds.  There is nothing that can be done
about the overall size limit imposed on basic(1) without a major rewrite
(not practical), but it *is* possible, and even fairly easy, to change
the way the available space is divided up.  At the moment, the split
is like this:

		500 variables and array elements
		700 statements
		800 bytes of DATA-statement space

Suggestions on improved allocations are welcome.  In particular, 700
statements is a very large program in BASIC, and 800 bytes of DATA
statements is almost certainly too small for anyone seriously using
them.  Any thoughts?  (Oh yes, variables/elements are 14 bytes each,
statements are 26 bytes each, and the total byte count cannot increase
much over what it is now.)

henry (10/05/82)

At Andy's request, and since nobody else voiced any opinions, BASIC's
size limits have been shuffled a little.  It now allows only 500
statements (instead of the previous 700) but has 6K available for
DATA statements.