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| Developer(s) | William Yu |
|---|---|
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows,Linux,Unix |
| Type | Programming |
| Website | rapidq |
RapidQ (also known asRapid-Q) is afree,cross-platform, semi-object-oriented dialect of theBASIC programming language. It can createconsole,graphical user interface, andCommon Gateway Interface applications. Theintegrated development environment includes adrag-and-dropform designer,syntax highlighting, and single-buttoncompilation. Versions are available forMicrosoft Windows,Linux,Solaris, andHP-UX.
Additional functionality not normally seen in BASIC languages are functioncallbacks and primitive object-orientation. The language is called semi-object-oriented by its author because there are only two levels of theclass hierarchy: built-in classes, and user-defined classes derived from those; the latter cannot be extended further. The ability tocall external sharedlibraries is available, thus giving full access to the underlyingoperating system'sapplication program interface. Other capabilities include built-in interfaces toDirectX andMySQL.
RapidQ features abytecode compiler that produces standaloneexecutables by binding the generated bytecode with theinterpreter. No externalrun time libraries are needed; the bytecode interpreter is self-contained. The file sizes of executable files created by RapidQ are about 150 kilobytes or larger for console applications.
RapidQ's author, William Yu, sold thesource code to REAL Software, the makers ofREALbasic, in 2000. The freely distributed program has been improved and many additional components have been created by an active user group.