Book - Programming for the Absolute Beginner 2nd Edition

Programming for the Absolute Beginner 2nd Edition by Jerry Ford

I was excited to see that a second edition of Jerry Ford's programming book was recently released.  It uses Just BASIC (all examples also compatible with Liberty BASIC) to teach the fundamentals of programming.

Jump to Amazon's link

Here is the table of contents.  :-)

1 Introduction to Programming
2 Creating Programs with Just BASIC
3 Creating Graphical User Interfaces
4 Working with Variables and Arrays
5 Making Decisions with Conditional Logic
6 Using Loops to Process Data
7 Improving Program Organization with Functions and Subroutines
8 Working with Text Files
9 Working with Sound and Graphics
10 Arcade-Style Computer Game Development
11 Debugging Your Applications

How to get started with Liberty BASIC

I got an email today from someone who was frustrated trying to figure out how to get started with Liberty BASIC.  This seemed like good blogging material.  :-)

Here is a start on the subject of getting started.

Try it - Download the trial software and install it.  It works on pretty much all versions of Windows that run on laptops and desktop PCs.  We don't support Windows Server but it may run.

  Here's the download link http://www.libertybasic.com/download.html

Liberty BASIC comes with a tutorial.  Once you start up Liberty BASIC look at the Help menu for the tutorial and the help documentation

There is a softcover book that you can purchase at Amazon's site.

  Here is the link for the book:
    http://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Programming-Liberty-BASIC-Gundel/dp/0557228115

Artificial Intelligence and BASIC

When I was 13 or so years old I bought a book at You-Do-It Electronics titled Experiments in Artificial Intelligence for Small Computers, authored by John Krutch. This book influenced me in important ways. It teaches the essentials of AI so anyone could understand it. Examples are presented in the BASIC programming language. One of the examples presented is of the classic Eliza sort of conversational system. Not cutting edge research, but as a starter it gets the job done.

I was able to use the techniques in the book to create demos for the computers at NEECO. A person visiting the store would ask the computer about itself, and the computer would try and respond appropriately with a demonstration of features.

The book can still be purchased used on Amazon.