Frequently Asked Questions

Here are some of the most common questions along with answers. This Faq is still short, but expected to grow on your input.

Question: Does yabasic still run under Windows XP ?
Answer: Yes. Yabasic and its setup program work well under Windows XP too. Please note however, that you need to download the zip-file.

Question: Does yabasic run under Wine ?
Answer: Yes. People have successfully installed the Windows-Version of yabasic under wine. Note however, that there is also a native linux-Version of yabasic.

Question: Can yabasic generate standalone programs, which may run without the yabasic executable ?
Answer: Yes and No. Yabasic does not translate its input into assembly, you always need the yabasic executable (interpreter). However, the bind-feature of yabasic allows to glue both, your yabasic-program and the yabasic executable, together and distribute it as a single file. In any case: the yabasic executable is rather small (<500 kB), so you may just pass it around with your yabasic programs.

Question: May I charge for my yabasic programs ?
Answer: Yes, you may. You may even distribute yabasic itself along with your software. Refer to the copyright for details.

Question: I have just typed in my yabasic program; How  do I save it ?
Answer: You cannot save it. Yabasic has no builtin editor and cannot save the text you have typed in ! You have to use another editor (e.g. Notepad under Windows) to create and save your yabasic programs. Details on how to do this can be found in the documentation of yabasic.

Question: Does yabasic handle unicode ?
Answer: No. The internals of yabasic can handle only 8-Bit characters and are therefore limited to what can be done in one of thos encodings, e.g. iso8859-p1. Vhanging this woul require a quite significant effort.

Question: What does the name yabasic mean ?
Answer: yabasic stands for yet-another-basic, an acronym aiming at the large number of different basic-dialects available, when yabasic had been created.