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BASIC256 2.1 Beta 1 — Qt6, WebAssembly & multi-platform

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@uglymike17 uglymike17 released this 18 Jul 12:36
v2.1.beta.01
8deba29

BASIC256 2.1 — Beta 1

The first official release of the revived BASIC256, continuing the classic
educational BASIC environment from the original SourceForge 2.0.0.11 codebase.
This Beta modernizes the whole stack — Qt6, CMake, a unified CI pipeline — and
adds a browser build so BASIC256 now runs with no install at all.

This is a pre-release. It's stable enough for everyday use and teaching,
but expect rough edges — please report anything you hit.

Highlights

  • Qt6 throughout. Migrated from Qt5, which unlocked everything below.
  • Runs in your browser. A full Qt-for-WebAssembly build of the editor and
    interpreter — no install needed. Live demo:
    https://uglymike17.github.io/basic256/
  • Four platforms, one pipeline. Windows, Linux x86-64, Raspberry Pi
    (ARM64), and macOS (Apple Silicon), each built and TestSuite-gated in CI.
  • New documentation site. A Docusaurus rebuild of the help at
    https://uglymike17.github.io/Basic256-Docs — this is now the in-app online
    help, and F1 on a keyword jumps straight to it.
  • Open Example on the desktop, browsable as a category tree (previously
    WASM-only); on macOS the Examples ship inside the .app.
  • 64-bit integers (qint64) for larger whole-number ranges.
  • Expanded CLI: graphics-only (-g) and text-only (-t) windows, a
    fullscreen flag (-f), and a silent/headless mode (-s).

Run a program straight from the browser link

parameter what it runs
?run= a bundled Example (e.g. ?run=Mandelbrot-256)
?url= a .kbs file on the same site (e.g. ?url=demo/goldenwaves.kbs)
?src= base64-encoded source embedded in the link

Add &mode= to pick the window layout (mirrors the CLI switches).

Downloads

  • Windows — installer (.exe)
  • Linux x86-64 — .zip; contains tar.gz and AppImage
  • Raspberry Pi (ARM64) — .zip; contains tar.gz and AppImage
  • macOS (Apple Silicon) — .zip; unzip and run

Known limitations (Beta)

  • The browser build can't do everything the desktop can: features that need
    the OS — external processes, serial ports, SQL, printing, TCP servers, and
    system text-to-speech — are stubbed and will report a runtime error in-browser.
  • macOS builds target Apple Silicon (arm64); Intel Macs aren't covered yet.
  • Being a Beta, some behaviour may change before 2.1 final.

Documentation & feedback

Full changes are listed in the ChangeLog.

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