Abstract
The late, hero computer scientist was just wrong about Basic. Dijkstra’s comment is academic sociology at its worst. It creates the illusion that programming skill derives from the use of politically correct platforms and languages.1 Dijkstra was wrong because Visual Basic is Turing-complete, and it has a formal and sensible syntax. Visual Basic is Turing-complete because you can use it to write any program, as long as you disregard resource consumption.
The use of Cobol cripples the mind, and its teaching should be regarded as a criminal offense.
—Edsger Dijkstra
It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to students that have had prior exposure to Basic; as potential programmers, they are mentally mutilated beyond all recognition.
—Edsger Dijkstra (in a foul mood)
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2004 Edward G. Nilges
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Nilges, E.G. (2004). The Syntax for the QuickBasic Compiler. In: Build Your Own .NET Language and Compiler. Apress, Berkeley, CA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4302-0698-9_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4302-0698-9_4
Publisher Name: Apress, Berkeley, CA
Print ISBN: 978-1-59059-134-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-4302-0698-9
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive