Altair Basic Interpreter Source Code (1975) [pdf]

Associated blog post from 2025:

Celebrate 50 years of Microsoft with the company's original Source code

https://www.gatesnotes.com/microsoft-original-source-code

(Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43575884)

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joebig 8 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

And all of it within ~4 Kbytes too!

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davidfekke 44 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Here is the 6502 assembly source code for Microsoft Basic:

https://github.com/microsoft/BASIC-M6502

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thrownawaysz an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

"FILE WILL BE DELETED AFTER PRINTING"

hah I've never seen that before but reminds me to roguelike games.

"permadeath coding" would be actually fun. IF compiler error THEN erase code repository or something like this

	▲	WillAdams 31 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Or, just buy the source for a dollar and bury it: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html
	▲	bitwize 7 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		The source code (and original assets) to many video games from as late as the 90s has been lost. The publishing company often deleted it after the game shipped, thinking it just took up space. This is one reason why, for example, there hasn't been a substantive remaster of Final Fantasy VII. Also, it sounds like you described Vigil: https://github.com/munificent/vigil

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piker an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

These two guys* were crazy productive in the 2 months they worked. Just the level of commenting shows how much thought they were able to give it during that span.

* plus the math package guy

	▲	jll29 21 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Does the code work? I.e., has anyone OCR'd the listing and fed it into an emulator yet?