Renumber command in BASIC

[Charles Richmond]

I am looking for some history information here:

Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber"
command??? Was "renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or
GW-BASIC or Radio Shack Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???

Note: The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in
the BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct
line *after* the renumbering.

[Derek]

Post by Charles Richmond
Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber"
command??? Was "renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or
GW-BASIC or Radio Shack Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???
Note:  The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in
the BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct
line *after* the renumbering.

That would be one of the Dartmouth BASIC versions from the 1960s. Not
sure which one but it was very early. Technically RENUMBER (like LIST,
RUN, SAVE, etc.) was a DTSS command rather than a BASIC command,
although many users weren't aware of the difference. This document, at
http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dartmouth/DTSS_descr_Oct64.pdf, says that
RENUMBER was under development at the original time of publishing.

Cheers

Derek

[Tom Lake]

Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber" command??? Was
"renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or GW-BASIC or Radio Shack
Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???
Note: The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in the
BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct line *after*
the renumbering.

If you're limiting yourself to microcomputers, Altair Extended BASIC (1976)
had it. If you mean the VERY first, Dartmouth BASIC had it in 1964.

TRS-80 Level II didn't come with it but RS sold a SYSTEM tape to add it.
TRS-80 Disk BASIC had it but RS used the NAME keyword for it rather than
RENUM. GW-BASIC and CoCo Extended BASIC also had it.

Tom Lake

[Carlo Zanziba]

Post by Tom Lake

Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber" command???
Was "renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or GW-BASIC or Radio
Shack Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???
Note: The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in the
BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct line
*after* the renumbering.

If you're limiting yourself to microcomputers, Altair Extended BASIC (1976)
had it. If you mean the VERY first, Dartmouth BASIC had it in 1964.

... and was called RESEQUENCE (with short form RES)

-- Carlo

Post by Tom Lake
TRS-80 Level II didn't come with it but RS sold a SYSTEM tape to add it.
TRS-80 Disk BASIC had it but RS used the NAME keyword for it rather than
RENUM. GW-BASIC and CoCo Extended BASIC also had it.
Tom Lake

[w***@yahoo.com]

Post by Carlo Zanziba

Post by Tom Lake

Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber" command???
Was "renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or GW-BASIC or Radio
Shack Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???
Note: The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in the
BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct line
*after* the renumbering.

If you're limiting yourself to microcomputers, Altair Extended BASIC (1976)
had it. If you mean the VERY first, Dartmouth BASIC had it in 1964.

... and was called RESEQUENCE (with short form RES)

Ah! The TI-99 Basic had RESEQUENCE (RES). It was supposed to be ANSI
minimal compatible. Must've had its roots from Dartmouth then.

What was annoying were those computers that didn't have it. I don't
remember the Apple II or the Commodore VIC/64 having a renumber
command.

[Mark Hobley]

Post by w***@yahoo.com
What was annoying were those computers that didn't have it. I don't
remember the Apple II or the Commodore VIC/64 having a renumber
command.

It was annoying, I remember finding a listing for a "renumber" program
on the ZX Spectrum. The Spectrum had a further annoyance, because its
line numbers were limited to four digits.

Mark.

[w***@yahoo.com]

Post by Mark Hobley

Post by w***@yahoo.com
What was annoying were those computers that didn't have it. I don't
remember the Apple II or the Commodore VIC/64 having a renumber
command.

It was annoying, I remember finding a listing for a "renumber" program
on the ZX Spectrum. The Spectrum had a further annoyance, because its
line numbers were limited to four digits.

Really? And it bothered me that the TI was limited to 32767... the
high bit was used to set breakpoints... I remember the Apple could go
to 65535

[Mark Hobley]

Post by w***@yahoo.com
Really?

Yeah. I had to standardize line numbering, so that subroutines that provided
certain functionality were always found at the same line number, allowing
them to be reused. I also had to reserve blocks of line numbers for loadable
modules (which could merge into the existing program). I had to make sure
that my line numbers were incremented in fives rather than tens, because when
they incremented in tens, I ran out of line numbers.

Mark.

[A***@NOT.AT.Arargh.com]

On Sat, 16 Jan 2010 08:08:02 GMT,

Post by Mark Hobley

Post by w***@yahoo.com
Really?

Yeah. I had to standardize line numbering, so that subroutines that provided
certain functionality were always found at the same line number, allowing
them to be reused. I also had to reserve blocks of line numbers for loadable
modules (which could merge into the existing program). I had to make sure
that my line numbers were incremented in fives rather than tens, because when
they incremented in tens, I ran out of line numbers.

I used to do the same kind of thing, but the basic I was using only
went to 9999. So, even more of a problem.

[Tom Lake]

Post by w***@yahoo.com
Really? And it bothered me that the TI was limited to 32767... the
high bit was used to set breakpoints... I remember the Apple could go
to 65535

How many lines did you need for a 16K TI-99/4A (48K with Expansion
Box)? The 32767 line number limit didn't really limit me at all.

Tom Lake

[winston19842005]

Post by Tom Lake

Post by w***@yahoo.com
Really? And it bothered me that the TI was limited to 32767... the
high bit was used to set breakpoints... I remember the Apple could go
to 65535

How many lines did you need for a 16K TI-99/4A (48K with Expansion
Box)? The 32767 line number limit didn't really limit me at all.
Tom Lake

It simplified porting over from other Basics... When you had sections of
code numbered>32767, then you had to change the line numbers as you entered
them.

At the beginning, when I first got it and was more naive, it just said to me
that the Apple could hold more. Yes it could, but it was still a naive
thought.

[dow]

Post by w***@yahoo.com

Post by Carlo Zanziba

Post by Tom Lake

Which BASIC dialect was the first to include the "renumber" command???
Was "renumber" available in TRS-80 Level II BASIC or GW-BASIC or Radio
Shack Extended Color BASIC for the Coco???
Note:  The "renumber" I mean... will modify all the references in the
BASIC code (goto, gosub, on...goto) to reference the correct line
*after* the renumbering.

If you're limiting yourself to microcomputers, Altair Extended BASIC (1976)
had it.  If you mean the VERY first, Dartmouth BASIC had it in 1964.

... and was called RESEQUENCE (with short form RES)

Ah! The TI-99 Basic had RESEQUENCE (RES). It was supposed to be ANSI
minimal compatible. Must've had its roots from Dartmouth then.
What was annoying were those computers that didn't have it. I don't
remember the Apple II or the Commodore VIC/64 having a renumber
command.- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -

The Commodore BASICs didn't have RENUMBER built in, but there were
plenty of add-on extensions available that included it.

dow