Development status Discontinued Type BASIC | Operating system | |
Developer(s) Optimized Systems Software Initial release 1983; 34 years ago (1983) License Copyright © 1983 Optimized Systems Software Proprietary | ||
BASIC A+ was developed by Optimized Systems Software of Cupertino, California, United States, to provide the Atari 8-bit family with an extended BASIC compatible with, but faster than, the simpler ROM-based Atari BASIC.
While Atari BASIC came on an 8 KB ROM cartridge, BASIC A+ was delivered on floppy disk and took 15 KB of the computer's RAM, leaving 23 KB available for user programs in a 48 KB Atari 800. BASIC A+ was offered at a price of US$80.00 in 1983, including the products OS/A+ and EASMD (Editor/Assembler), and being an extension of Atari BASIC, came with a supplement to the latter's reference manual as its documentation. In addition to being faster than its ROM-bound counterpart, BASIC A+ provided a number of extra commands for DOS operations, player/missile graphics, and debugging.