Talk:PowerBASIC/Archive 1

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this page looks more like an advertisment than a real article. especially the characteristics section. almost like assembler? i would like to see some serious data before i believe this. --80.140.173.115 00:24, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
 * What can you see as advertising in this material? All characteristics are almost correct! It is a compiled language (not interpreted), its programs don't need external RTL (actually, a very small RTL is packed in any PowerBASIC program, its size depends on used WIN32 API functions and so on, it is not an all-pupose RTL). It produces programs that are REALLY compact and rather fast. It is NOT an assembler of couse, but one can use inline asm to improve programs speed. And PowerBASIC is really able to give free access to the third party DLL; a good example you can see provided with distribution of RMChart DLL. (Sorry for my bad English). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.19.226.194 (talk • contribs) 07:33, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Unambiguous expressions?
>>"The compilers' parsing of mathematical expressions is very unambiguous, while in other languages it can involve some guess-work to determine how formulas will be interpreted by the compiler."

That's just nonsense. If you have to guess, then it's because you don't know the language. Properly formed expressions aren't ambiguous. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Molar999 (talk • contribs) 04:37, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

...
someone please fix the article with NPOV relevent info? since when did wikipedia become a soapbox for advertising —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.134.248.200 (talk • contribs) 07:06, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
 * The concerns raised previously have been addressed and checked for a NPOV. Comments are welcomed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.17.204.214 (talk • contribs) 13:00, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I find it valuable
I find the article valuable. I'm not a PowerBasic customer but I rely on WikiPedia to provide straight information on a variety of technologies such as Microsoft's Windows, Microsoft's Visual Basic, PowerBasic, RealBasic, Java and so on. The value of Wikipedia would be diminished greatly if you rejected an informative article like this one. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.103.41.146 (talk) 17:40, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

COI
Note that User:67.17.204.214, a major contributor to the article, is an IP address that traces back to PowerBasic -Halo (talk) 18:18, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree that some of the recent edits Halo reverted were fluffy; so, thanks. Pete St.John (talk) 17:23, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
 * man Halo you have your work cut out for you. Pete St.John (talk) 17:18, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Meanwhile I've been putting notes on the (new) talk pages of IPs contributing. If they are aware that there is a discussion they may participate, and together we may post good information in a neutral way. Pete St.John (talk) 19:22, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Note that 67.17.204.214 identified himself (diff) as "Tim Robbins PowerBASIC Inc." — Athaenara ✉  00:39, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Factual Information
1- Are you saying it's "fluffy" to mention a "peer-to-peer" user forum? If so, why is this standard only applied to PowerBASIC? Virtually every vendor of programming languages has a link to their user forums on their Wikipedia page. Why is it that you only destroy PowerBASIC links, and not the others? Why is it done over and over? [posted by 71.100.238.224 18:48, 9 March 2008 (UTC)]
 * I'm here, and not everywhere, because of the self-promotion notification. What we hope is that the hostilities subsume as the promoters of a subject/product, who are often honest fans, come to respect the wiki's standards for NPOV and no-self-promotion and no-advertising. I'm not against PowerBasic; Borland provided historic alternatives. The issue is saying too much, too broadly; keeping to dry facts with a neutral tone. We want the article to be neutral and balanced and not read like an advertisement for a commercial product; much of that is merely stylistic. If you keep to single ammendations of dry fact supported by references we'll all be happy; but if you copy in too much of the product's website, or equivalent, people will react as I did. It's simply easier to revert a paragraph if the tone is promotional, than to re-edit it for you, picking out the acceptable parts. You will be more effective improving this article if you do one definite supportable point at a time. Pete St.John (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

2- Are you saying it's inappropriate to provide compatibility information? At one point, PowerBASIC had a succinct and accurate list of the operating systems supported. That information has been repeatedly destroyed, and replaced with obvious misinformation. Why do you demean the person who corrects the error? The correct terms "Win95, Win98, WinME..." were replaced with a wholly incorrect single term "95 onward". At a minimum, it should have said "Windows 95" or "Win95". However, even more egregious is the suggestion that PowerBASIC does not support WinNT (which it does). WinNT preceded Win95 by years, so the erroneous line is blatantly wrong. WinME is a common problem to many vendors, because of the well-known stability issues. Even further, why was WinVista and Win2008 removed? Many software products are still, to this day, incompatible with these latest OS's, but one may not realize it because their data sheets were constructed before the coming of this latest event. How is a reader to understand compatibility if it is not listed? [posted by 71.100.238.224 18:48, 9 March 2008 (UTC)]
 * It's just bloat to replace "Win95 onward" with "Win 95, Win 98, Win NT 1, Win NT 2, ..." If people want compatibility specifics they can go to the product's website (which is why linking in wiki can be beneficial to an enterprise, without overstepping advertising). The article is not a spec-sheet. I agree that "95" should be "Win95". You might consider "Win 95 onwards, excepting Win ME, and MS Vista is in beta" or something like that. We want a sentence, not a spec sheet. PowerBASIC isn't that big. Pete St.John (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

3- Why is it necessary to use the word "commercial" repeatedly. Isn't a single use, in the first sentence, more than enough? I understand you may be a proponent of open-source software, and that's perfectly acceptable. But such repetition helps nobody. It just pounds the reader. over and over, with what some people feel is a negative term. [posted by 71.100.238.224 18:48, 9 March 2008 (UTC)]
 * I'd agree. My revert may have been too wholesale; but you can beat that, by making one change at a time, and rebut any disagreement one topic at a time. Pete St.John (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

4- Why is it necessary to characterize PowerBASIC FORMS negatively because it's an add-on product? There are 2 possible reasons it's an add-on:

4A- It's an attempt by the publisher to maximize revenue by overcharging the customer.

4B- It's an attempt by the publisher to only charge the customer for the features they choose to purchase.

The answer can only be determined by an in-depth study of the value provided for the purchase price. However, since PowerBASIC gives free advertising space to competitors of PowerBASIC FORMS, I lean very strongly towards 4B. Yes, that's correct, they give absolutely FREE advertising space to visual designer competitors on their web site. [posted by 71.100.238.224 18:48, 9 March 2008 (UTC)]
 * Every product has deals and features. We just don't want to advertise. The article on Wendy's doesn't mention the current sale item. But again, it's mostly a matter of tone. Pete St.John (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I could ask many more tough questions about the treatment PowerBASIC has received here, but I'll try very hard to keep it at a businesslike level. I'll just look forward to hearing your response to the above questions?

By the way, I notice you consider yourself an "Expert C Programmer". You should certainly be very proud of that accomplishment -- but do you suppose it's had an affect on your attitude towards a lowly BASIC compiler which outperforms most C products? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.100.238.224 (talk) 18:48, 9 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Most of my work currently is in MSVB-- a fine product for slapping together UIs quickly on the MS platform. I despise MS for it's monopolism, however. I'm told by some beowulf programmers that various versions of FORTRAN are competitively efficient, but it's not a very expressive medium for me. Java is very expressive and I'm told that the overhead of the VM is much reduced. LISP has fixed some efficiency issues (mainly on account of past reliance on special hardware) and is definitely more expressive than C for many important things. No version of BASIC is where I would think to look for max efficiency, but it's certainly good that new versions are more efficient for the people who are using it (usually for other reasons, e.g. installed code-base). People who use emacs instead of vi are, in fact, putrid scum, but I'm definitely not religious about languages :-) Incidentally, please consider creating an account, it facilitates dialog and as a practical matter you'l tend to be taken more seriously. Pete St.John (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Edit Verification
To meet the requirements of the Wikipedia verification policy, I am quoting the sources for the edits made to the Powebasic page.

returning DWORD in FPU

Official reply

Deleted Thread I've now spent some time tracking down the source of the inconsistency between PB's DWORDs and the unsigned long integers stipulated in much C code. It centers on PB's DWORDs and their behavior when their value exceeds DWORD maximum (0FFFFFFFFh). Their value does not necessarily wrap beyond zero; instead, it's often truncated at zero. Although I suspected that something like this was occurring, actually spotting this behavior took some time because simply incrementing a DWORD to maximum, and then beyond maximum, causes its value to wrap as expected (to zero, then one, then two, and so on). However, the following code shows the truncation occurring:

x??? = &hE1DDA73Cx2??? = (x??? * x???) This operation leaves x2??? = 0.

Such behavior becomes a problem when an algorithm relies on values wrapping, and that's exactly what's expected in many cryptographic and hashing algorithms. This is how I stumbled across the behavior. It's also why most programmers probably never have a problem with PB's DWORDs: They want to avoid overloading a variable and thus rely on the DWORD's big capacity. I also must stress that I've never noted anything odd about PB's DWORDs when used for other purposes. PowerBASIC itself maintains that the result of any operation will be correct within the limits of the data types stipulated by the programmer, and I've never even heard of anyone with an experience that might cast doubt on the credibility of this claim.

The central point is this. An inconsistency exists between the output of at least some C compilers and PowerBASIC compilers. I can offer my own experience as evidence that in certain circumstances, the inconsistency can have practical consequences. I've also found a simple way to resolve this issue. Use PB's long integers in cryptographic and hashing algorithms where DWORDs are expected. The algorithms then return the expected results, bit for bit--which of course is the only correct way to judge the accuracy of the output.

more DWORD issue

English Alphabet strings

Incorrect string handling

In this thread, contributors wrote a function to convert a string to a number. A simple version using pointers yeilded 370 clock cycles compared to 5200 for the built in PB version. Using ASM that was reduced further to 90 Clks.

no support

A deleted thread powerbasic Staff member, Dave Navvaro states: "we will have a compiler for Linux some time this year"

The original thread It should be noted that despite the alleged "No Vaporware" Policy, a Linux compiler has never materialized.

Offending user's may also find their personal information disseminated as PowerBASIC has no Privacy policy. Personal information disseminated

My assertion: "PowerBASIC COM integration is limited" is discussed fully here "PB returns DISP_E_EXCEPTION. This highlights a very serious shortcoming with PB-automation, and is why PB-automation can be a nightmare to work it."

I state: "Little, if any, official support is provided". This can be easily verified by looking at any category of the user forum for posts by powerbasic staff going back at least 5 years. Mr Zale also states: "It's not possible to include a free lifetime consulting service.... This is simply not something we can do free of charge based upon upgrade prices under $100. We'd like you to get the assistance as inexpensively as possible, and I really hope you can make a connection here. However, if all else fails, we have always offered paid technical assistance for "in-depth" problems of this nature. Feel free to contact us at your convenience if that is of interest to you."

"PowerBASIC strictly enforces a policy requiring forum users to use their full real name when posting" As stated directly on the User Forum signup: "Forum Rules To post, you must register with your full, real name (both first and last names). No handles or abbreviations are allowed. ... Profanity, rude, or disparaging comments (about PowerBASIC or others) is strictly prohibited... The owners of PowerBASIC Peer Support Forums reserve the right to remove, edit, move or close any thread for any reason."

I assert PowerBASIC staff are very sensitive to criticism and users are frequently banned.

From Mr Zale himself:

'posted June 11, 2004 04:21 AM Actually, suspension was for a very short period of time... enough to "cool off"...  certainly not permanent. Long ago, he was offered reinstatement upon agreement to follow forum rules. Regards, Bob Zale PowerBASIC Inc.

Banned

Another example

This thread was also deleted, because it pointed out the unsigned integer inconsitency in the compiler. "I've had more than one experience while converting C to PB in which PB's DWORDs have created results that don't match the results of the same operations employing unsigned integers when coded in C. " The thread is still available here Any casual developer can verify this in seconds, but if you do not know it's there you are likely to waste hours looking for a non-existent bug.

As I suggested a month ago in my post on the COI page these facts are being deliberatly withheld by powerbasic staff who would see this infomation as counter to their marketing aims. I would appreciate help with these edits to provide the most wikipedia compatible wording.

RealWorldExperience (talk) 03:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I noticed you deleted the most recent edits. Perhaps we should discuss the facts presented here and try and agree on some neutral wording? RealWorldExperience (talk) 23:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Rebuttal
"Real World Experience" is a single purpose account, created to attack PowerBASIC, Inc. It appears he has no "edits" other than those which are antagonistic towards PowerBASIC.

On Jan 30, 2008, a PowerBASIC Forum Administrator realized that this user was posting under a false identity, which was not allowed under forum policies in place for 12 years. The Admin asked this user to restrict posts to his real name in the future, just as done by thousands of other members.

In retaliation, the user began a vendetta against PowerBASIC, Inc. On Feb 3, 2008, be began a campaign of misinformation on the Free Basic BBS. When that received little support, he took the same misinformation to the VB Wire BBS. Now, he's brought the same tired arguments here, to Wikipedia.

1- "Real World Experience" said, "Little, if any, official support is provided". This is not truthful. For many years, PowerBASIC has offered absolutely free, one-on-one, technical support by email. Paid support is only required when it involves custom programming, debugging of user programming errors, or custom research outside the bounds of the PowerBASIC compiler. This policy is virtually unmatched in the industry.

2- "Real World Experience" said, "There are currently no full time staff offering support." That is a false, reckless, and slanderous statement with no validation of any kind. PowerBASIC has highly qualified, full time technicians who provide excellent technical support.

3- "Real World Experience" said, "Little, if any, official support is provided in these forums." That is false. A quick review of the active forums show that PowerBASIC employees have actually posted 18,771 messages in support of PowerBASIC customers. If archived forums were included, the total would be much higher. Of course, for serious support issues, PowerBASIC recommends that customers use free, one-on-one support instead.

4- "Real World Experience" said, "This situation is especially relevant for new users who may suddenly find themselves without access to any real support." This is wild speculation intended to inflame and agitate the casual reader. It has no basis in fact, and is without merit. It is nothing more than the writer's imagination about what might occur in the worst possible scenario at some future date. One might just as easily say "The moon may explode today". They have about an equal chance of occurring. The truth: "No licensed PowerBASIC customer has ever been refused support in the entire history of the company." The worst that might be said is that the very occasional abusive customer is delayed just a bit, at least until he regains composure.

5- "Real World Experience" said, "PowerBASIC currently has no clearly stated Privacy policy." That, too, is absolutely false. PowerBASIC has published a very definitive privacy policy for over eleven years. We're proud to note that we've improved it from time to time, in favor of our valued customers. Please feel free to view it.

6- "Real World Experience" said, "[sic] user's may also find their personal information disseminated". That, too, is wild speculation and very reckless. Never, in the history of the company, has PowerBASIC ever released a customer's contact information. No mailing address. No email. No residence address. No telephone number. Not once. Of course, when you register for the PowerBASIC Forums, you authorize the use of your full real name, since it's a published item. And, in the case of "Real World Experience", he voluntarily and personally published his city of residence in every forum message.

7- "Real World Experience" said, "String functions MCase$ UCase$ LCase$ UCode$ ACode$ only handle the English alphabet". That is absolutely false. Many years ago, it was true, as was very common in the era of DOS programming. However, the last five (5) versions of PowerBASIC for Windows and PowerBASIC Console Compiler have offered excellent support for international character sets.

8- "Real World Experience" said, "MCASE$ UCASE$...are slow compared to ASM routines commonly applied to these tasks". We dispute this claim in its entirety, and respectfully note that he has provided absolutely no substantiation for his allegation. Frankly, we chuckled at the notion that an experienced programmer would believe assembler routines are commonly applied to these tasks. Visual Basic, his latest compiler of choice, does not even offer an assembler.

9- "Real World Experience" said, "I assert PowerBASIC staff are very sensitive to criticism". This is a distasteful personal attack on the employees of PowerBASIC, Inc. It clearly has no place on Wikipedia.

10- "Real World Experience" said, "This thread was also deleted, because it pointed out the unsigned integer [sic]inconsitency...". This is nothing more than wild speculation, using charged words in order to inflame an issue which does not exist. If this thread was actually deleted by a PowerBASIC Admin, the writer could not possibly have any knowledge of the reason. Obviously, that's why he failed to provide any substantiation. There was no reason to follow this up, but the archive tag in the URL leads me to suspect it's simply age.

11- "Real World Experience" said, "users are frequently banned." This is false, reckless, and slanderous. Did he provide a count of banned users? Did he provide a list of banned users? What is his definition of the word "frequently"? Once again, he's using charged words in a distasteful attempt to denigrate a company with high ethical standards. Yes, we occasionally find it necessary to suspend a forum member. Yes, sometimes we find it necessary to delete a thread. Sometimes for piracy. Sometimes for abusive behavior. Sometimes for flooding posts. Sometimes for other valid reasons. With close to 300,000 messages posted, there will always be a few bad apples. But, that does not equate to "users are frequently banned". He's entitled to his personal opinion, but it has no place on Wikipedia.

We should note that this user is still welcome as an active member of the PowerBASIC Forums. He is not barred from entry, as long as he uses his real full name as stated in the PowerBASIC Forum Rules and Policies.

There's much more, but I think I'll stop here. In my opinion, "Real World Experience" has made a mockery of the Wikipedia concept. That's really a shame. If anyone has a question about PowerBASIC or the truth presented here, I'll be happy to offer any assistance needed.

Tim Robbins PowerBASIC, Inc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.17.204.214 (talk) 15:33, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Third opinion
User forums and newsgroups are most certainly not reliable sources. Criticisms and other information must be verifiable in reputable references. Concerns about improper conflicts of interest can be addressed at WP:COI/N. Concerns about reliable sourcing can be raised at WP:RS/N. Concerns about disruptive and uncooperative behavior can be raised at WP:AN/I. Vassyana (talk) 03:34, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for those links. Please see my post about relaible sources as it pertains to this entry RealWorldExperience (talk) 08:19, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Response
Hello Tim, Thank you for responding. It would be helpfull if you registered as suggest last month by an administrator, so that we could be clear who you are.

I think you raise some valid points and I welcome the opportunity to work with you to create some more accurate and fair wording for this entry. I think I should make it perfectly clear that my intention is to present ALL the facts about powerbasic not just the ones that are convenient to your marketing aims. I also recognize that this is not a forum for personal experiences or opinion so we should just stick to the verifiable facts.

Like most developers I use up to twenty different software products designed for development every day. Powerbasic was simply one of those elements. I intend to edit many entries at Wikipedia that I have detailed information about, this just happens to be the first one. I recognize that Mr Zale describes Powerbasic as his life's work, but I suggest that this is providing a conflict of interest for any of your submissions and you should probably let the wikipedia process of multiple editors prevail rather than reverting any edits that you don't like.

My personal opinion, not that it is relevant here, is that powerbasic is a perfectly fine product, for what it is, but like all software, has limitiations and differences that are relevant to any comprehensive description. I feel that the full truth of the product, however inconvenient to the marketing aims of the company, should be presented here. This should not be a hinderence to Powerbasic as I think it is pretty much understood that no software product is perfect. Even Powerbasic has to occasionally acknowledge a mistake was made, even if it means that all existing code be changed. My hope is that we can find some wording to agree on.

Starting with your rebuttal for my Support contribution, I agree that the language could be improved. I post on many many internet forums devoted to a wide range of products and subjects. Most are general purpose and probably do not warrent comment. Becuase you link your forum to the Wikipedia entry and declare it the "official" forum, and because it is the offical repository of fact relative to the powerbasic product, you introduce it as valid element for inclusion in a well rounded wikipedia entry. I don't disagree with that. For no,w I shall confine myself to this and leave out supporting evidence from third party forums.

The Powerbasic forum has five categories of product support. A quick count oreveals that Since Oct 1st 2008 (six months ago) there were 8505 posts in these forums as reported by the search engine. PowerBasic Console Compiler - 6 pages - 1134 posts

PowerBasic for DOS - 1 page - 253 posts

PowerBasic for Windows - 22 pages - 4602 posts

Programming - 8 pages - 1958 posts

Programming the Internet - 3 pages - 561 posts

In those six months the count of posts from Powerbasic personel was:

Tom Hanlin, PowerBASIC Staff - 0 posts

Borje Hagsten, PowerBASIC Staff - 0 posts

Neil Bertz, PowerBASIC Staff - 0 posts

Tim Robbins, Administrator - 0 posts

Bob Gee, Administrator - 0 posts

Lance Edmonds, Administrator - 0 posts

(This aministrator suddenly dissapeared in July 2004 with no explanation)

Steve Rossell, Administrator - 32 posts (12 in the last few weeks, 2 contained no support, leaving 18 actual support posts of which most are a line or two like: "The REG statement and function can be used to communicate via a register array in both directions with a TSR. This is outlined in chapter 14 of the PowerBASIC For DOS Reference Guide.")

Bob Zale, Administrator - 48 posts (6 contained no support or a sugestion to email support@powerbasic.com 22 are within the last few weeks (since lack of support was first cited) so cannot be taken at face value. I suspect these are the product of an effort to jumpstart perception like this

A very different tone from just a few months ago in posts like this "It's called a negative number. You've heard of those???" and "Someone please tell me that in the 21st century it's possible to phrase this question without reminding me of an attack dog?" and "Well, I'm not sure now we can communicate with you. We've actually spent hours trying to explain it privately, but without success." and outright sales posts like this and this and leaving out 7 which are trivial one or two line responses, hardly worthy of the title "support" we are left with 12 actual posts from Mr Zale and 18 from Mr Rossell for a grand total of 30 support posts of any real value in SIX MONTHS.

When you consider that there were 8508 posts asking for help in that time, a contribution of 30 official replies accounts for less than 0.5% of support offered by the Powebasic company.

By Comparison, just three members of the support team for another popular compiler, PureBasic, (Fred, Freak and Beriko) managed to contribute to 780 threads, and an average of six posts per thread. That's over 4600 posts of official support in the same time frame. There are many more members of their support team also contributing.

In light of this I suggest that the phrase "Little, if any, official support is provided in these forums" is accurate, but I conceed a more accurate wording could be found in the phrase: "little (less than 0.5 percent) official help is provided in the forums"

Your claim that: "PowerBASIC has offered absolutely free, one-on-one, technical support by email" to be accepted, you should have to meet the same standard of proof required on Wikipedia that everyone else does. On face, this statement is not verifiable. Further, it is quite clear from this post that support is an additional cost promoted via the forums. "It's not possible to include a free lifetime consulting service.... This is simply not something we can do free of charge based upon upgrade prices under $100. We'd like you to get the assistance as inexpensively as possible, and I really hope you can make a connection here. However, if all else fails, we have always offered paid technical assistance for "in-depth" problems of this nature. Feel free to contact us at your convenience if that is of interest to you."

In fact your current website makes it clear that "free" support includes little more that pointers to the manual that comes with the product adding "Should your request goes beyond the intent of the technical support and resources we offer for free you will be advised there will be a $49 per incident charge if you would like us to proceed with your request." In a balanced entry, this distinction should be covered.

Leaving aside the recent changes to the Powerbasic privacy policy in light of this dispute, and concrete evidence of flagrant abuse of personal information that do not belong here, I will move next to the subject of banning or "suspending" customers that conduct "abusive behaviour". Given the context of the wikipedia verification policy it would be impossible to represent this here even with a stack of sworn afadvits. I also recognize that a group of individuals experience does not rise to the level of relevance untill it is covered in print. Until then this will remain out of my contribution here at Wikipedia.

Since, as you point out, I cannot know why a thread is mysteriously deleted, perhaps you can offer an explanation for the sudden disapearance of this thread (available here) relating to the unsigned integer incompatabilities recently? If, as you hilariously suggest, this threads "age" is responsible for its deletion then it would seem logical that all the other threads of the same or earlier "age" would have been deleted also, yet they have not.

The deletion of this specific thread, written after many hours of detective work, by a very well respected developer, proves not only that threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff, but that there is a direct attempt to suppress the fact that unsigned Integers are incompatible with mainstream languages like C. This is proof of "sensitivity".

As the author concluded "The central point is this. An inconsistency exists between the output of at least some C compilers and PowerBASIC compilers... in certain circumstances, the inconsistency can have practical consequences". I think we could probably go a little further and qualify what thos circumstances are specifically, but this is fact is indisputable as covered extensively in my last post here.

Since you challenge the statement "String functions MCase$ UCase$ LCase$ UCode$ ACode$ only handle the English alphabet" I will prepare and cover this in a later post.

Finally, you acknowledge that users are required to use their full real name when registering and posting on the powerbasic forums, why not simply edit my submission instead of deleting it? Surely there can be no dispute about this fact, it is clearly stated in the signup procedure of the forum.

In this post, at a minimum, I have proved the following statements and will post them to the entry. I would respectfully ask you not to delete them.

"little (less than 0.5 percent) official help is provided in the forums"

"Help beyond the intent of the technical support and resources we offer for free will be charged $49 per incident"

"threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff"

"staff are sensitive to criticism"

"An inconsistency exists between the output of at least some C compilers and PowerBASIC compilers"

"users are required to use their full real name when registering and posting on the powerbasic forums"

I hope that we can work together to create a fair and balanced entry for Powerbasic. RealWorldExperience (talk) 08:20, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Rebuttal
The actions of "Real World Experience" are plain and simple vandalism. His most recent paragraph of inappropriate antagonism was added to the PowerBASIC page twice.

1- "Real World Experience" said, "[sic] Becuase you link your forum to the Wikipedia entry and declare it the "official" forum, and because it is the offical repository of fact relative to the powerbasic product..."

This is a fabrication. The notation of an "official" forum was added by 63.157.90.231 on May 1, 2006. It has since been removed. The PowerBASIC Forums are Peer Support Forums, frequented by thousands of folks with widely varying needs and agendas. The vast majority of them are wonderful friends and customers, but your suggestion that PowerBASIC has deemed them to have created the "official repository of fact relative to the PowerBASIC product" is not correct. Even further, at this time, there isn't even a link to the PowerBASIC Forums on Wikipedia.

2- "Real World Experience" said, "Lance Edmonds, Administrator - 0 posts (This [sic] aministrator suddenly [sic] dissapeared in July 2004 with no explanation).

This is another false statement. On Aug 18, 2004, the following message was posted on the PowerBASIC forums by Lance:

"Hi folks!" "Thanks all for the kind words! It was a real pleasure working for PowerBASIC and I do miss it, however life will continue in a different (and hopefully equally fulfilling) direction for me now! Anyway, I'm going to embark on some of my own software projects for the short term, and we'll see what develops from there.  In any case, I'm still an avid PowerBASIC programmer and supporter, so I will still be dropping by from time to time to put my 2-cents in."

3- "Real World Experience" said, "Leaving aside the recent changes to the Powerbasic privacy policy in light of this dispute..."

This is another fabrication. The PowerBASIC Privacy Statement today has the same text as the Privacy Statement of August 23, 2000. Eight years ago. This fact can be verified here.

4- "Real World Experience" said, "When you consider that there were 8508 posts asking for help..."

This is yet another fabrication. By his own words, earlier in the message, there were 8508 total posts, not 8508 requests for help. The number of requests for help would obviously be much lower than the total. It's clear this was re-phrased in order to twist his mathematical calculation to fit a result which matched his agenda. The result of that calculation was then posted to the PowerBASIC page without regard for the misinformation.

5- "Real World Experience" said, "it is quite clear from this post that support is an additional cost promoted via the forums"

This is yet another false statement. "Real World Experience" knows it is false, because he is the one who asked the original question on the PowerBASIC Forums. Our employees are experts on the PowerBASIC compiler. Our employees provide absolutely free technical support for questions about how to use the PowerBASIC compiler. But he asked a question about Microsoft Visual Basic, not PowerBASIC. He had a program written in Visual Basic, and he wanted to recreate its functionality in a PowerBASIC program. He did not understand some of the statements and functions used in Visual Basic, and he wanted us to provide that information, or perhaps even write the PowerBASIC program for him. If our representative knew the quick answer to his Visual Basic problem, he would have certainly shared it. We do that every day. But, we are not Visual Basic experts. In order to answer his questions about Visual Basic, or to write his program for him, we would have to do some fairly lengthy research on that product and his specific problem. That is very clear. It's also very clear that such research and custom programming is well beyond the scope of technical support from any company. Mr. Zale wrote him a very polite, businesslike message to explain it fully.

PowerBASIC is a programming tool. It is used by programmers to create an application program. We sell the tool to create a program. We will help you by answering questions about the tool, but we can't create your programs for you, and we can't answer technical questions about other programming tools. That would be a lifetime consulting service. If one were to follow the somewhat twisted logic of "Real World Experience", you could:

A- Visit your Sears store and buy a hammer. B- Expect them to teach you to build a house or build it for you. C- Expect them to teach you to use an air-hammer you bought elsewhere.

Of course, then Wikipedia Editors would have to go to the Sears page and:

A- Add an entry that Sears won't build your house if you buy a hammer. B- Add an entry that Sears won't teach you to use tools bought elsewhere. C- Then move on to appliances, televisions, etc.

6- "Real World Experience" said, "little (less than 0.5 percent) official help is provided in the forums".

This is yet another fabricated claim. As explained earlier, the numbers used in the mathematical calculations were manipulated by "Real World Experience" in order to provide a result that he desires. However, even if his mathematics were truthful, the entire statement is immaterial. The PowerBASIC Forums Registration Agreement advises each customer that: "This forum has been created for "Peer-to-Peer" questions and discussions.  While PowerBASIC employees may contribute, this forum is not a source of official support.". At PowerBASIC, we believe that free, one-on-one, technical support provides a much better result for most programming issues. Of course, it's still nice to know that PowerBASIC employees have contributed 18,771 forum posts in support of our valued customers.

7- "Real World Experience" said, "staff are sensitive to criticism"

The truth is, we welcome criticism, as it's a key element in the evolution of our products. Of course, false statements about us and our products must be addressed with facts.

8- "Real World Experience" said, "threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff".

This is a false statement. It is not verifiable, but is obviously just the personal opinion of the author. Original content is not allowed on Wikipedia pages.

9- "Real World Experience" said, "PowerBASIC differs from mainstream languages like C in a few respects, most notably in its use of the FPU for DWORD unsigned integer calculations. Since overloading an integer is fundamental to Encryption algorithm's in most languages, this presents a unique problem in PowerBASIC."

PowerBASIC is not a C compiler, and it does not attempt to emulate any one particular C Compiler the writer has in mind. PowerBASIC is a PowerBASIC Compiler, a proprietary compiler built only to the PowerBASIC specification. It is not built to a C specification, any more than a Chevrolet is built to a Nissan specification. The conclusion "...this presents a unique problem in PowerBASIC." is not verifiable, but just the personal opinion of the author. Original content is not allowed on Wikipedia.

10- Admins and Editors of Wikipedia with far more experience than either myself or "Real World Experience" have previously determined that all reference to the PowerBASIC Forums should be removed. These editors ("Halo", "62.172.143.205", "PeterStJohn", "Flowanda") are unanimous in their opinion that even a forum link should not appear on the page. Given their level of experience, I feel compelled to accede to their judgement. I am removing all references to the PowerBASIC Forums.

11- An Editor of Wikipedia (Flowanda) with far more experience than either myself or "Real World Experience" has previously determined that all references to PowerBASIC Support should be removed. Given the level of experience, I feel compelled to accede to that judgement. I am removing all references to PowerBASIC Support.

If anyone has a question about PowerBASIC or the facts presented here, I'll be happy to offer any assistance needed.

Tim Robbins PowerBASIC, Inc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.17.204.214 (talk) 15:37, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Verifiability
I noticed you deleted all of my contribution yet again. It would be more helpful, not to mention a show of good faith, if you would participate in the process and edit my contributions instead of completely deleting them!

Now that you have removed the link to the powerbasic forums, and elected to not sanction the description of "official" Powerbasic forum, perhaps some other relevant links would be appropriate. I agree with you that they are in fact "user to user" forums and will reword my contribution accordingly. I also agree with your wording "this forum is not a source of official support." Additionally, Your own website states: "Should your request goes beyond the intent of the technical support and resources we offer for free you will be advised there will be a $49 per incident charge if you would like us to proceed with your request." So I am not sure why you deleted that too?

As I indicated, the last remnants of company support suddenly left the powerbasic forums with Lance in July 2004 as confirmed in the thread you quoted. As another member put it "you may indeed be correct. lance's last post was july 5, 2004 and the last post that indicated he was powerbasic support was june 25... also, between march 6 and march 7 of this year lance changed his title from "administrator" to "member". if he is indeed gone i wish him a lot of luck!" It seems pretty clear that no one at the time had any idea what happened. But this is irrelevant and I only mention it because Lance provided technical support via the forums (as can be seen by any casual search of his posts). The current levels of participation in the forum by powerbasic staff cannot under any stretch of the imagination be considered support.

Because 30 support posts of any real value in SIX MONTHS cannot be considered support, and there is no eveidence of alleged "email support", my statement that "little if any real support is offered" is valid. Support is a key issue to novice developers and should be clearly represented in the wikipedia entry.

Thank you for helping with the wording of "there were 8508 total posts, not 8508 requests for help". This is perhaps a more accurate statement and as I have said all along I welcome your input. Since we agree on this number, perhaps you can justify your statement of "18,771 messages in support of PowerBASIC customers"?

The numbers I quoted are easily verifyable from your search engine. simply type in any of the historical support staff names like "Steve Rossell" or "Bob Zale" under "User Name:", highlight the five forums in which users confine thier posts for help: PowerBasic Console Compiler

PowerBasic for DOS

PowerBasic for Windows

Programming

Programming the Internet

then hit search. If you look at page two you will see that posts in the last six months immediatly dry up. A grand total of 32 posts from Mr Rossel and 48 posts from Mr Zale.

A quick review of these posts shows that in fact Mr Rossel contributed 18 posts of any significant help and Mr Zale only 12 (leaving aside Mr Zale's recent spurt of enthusaism).

This is a verifyable FACT. Anyone can verify these numbers. This is not my opinion. Even if we include every post made in that timeframe as real "support" we are still only talking about 80 out of 8500, thats still less than one percent! This is a relevant verifyable fact.

Your point 5 contains no references or even vague offers of proof. You mention Microsoft Visual Basic, seem to assert that Visual Basic users should be entitled to support from powerbasic staff etc etc. I am unclear how any of this is relevant?

It is interesting to note that you use an internet archive to support your arguments about historical posts when is suits you, yet have so far to acknowledge that the post relating to the incompatability of unsigned integers was targeted and deleted. If you statement "The truth is, we welcome criticism, as it's a key element in the evolution of our products" is true, then cite an example from your forums of criticism that has been embraced.

In fact powerbasic would like to dodge all accountability as clearly demonstrated when this [thread was deleted.] The user claims: "This entire issue started when Bob challenged me to prove that PowerBASIC/Linux had ever been announced as "coming real soon" and accused me of lying. I provided the proof. (Linux is coming soon, and other platforms will follow.) He deleted my post, banned me from the forum and has now apparently deleted the actual evidence that I cited as well.

While I agree that these comments do not meet the standard of verifiabilty for inclusion in a Wikipedia entry, clearly a thread has been deleted, and clearly it was critical of Powerbasic's false announcement of a linux compiler. This IS verifiable evidence of sensitivity to criticism and thread deletion. At a minimum this should be included in a wikipedia entry.

Your unwillingness here to acknowledge that Powerbasic is incompatible with mainstream compilers in that it uses the FPU for unsigned integer calculations and returns 64bit signed quad integer values st(0) of the FPU (unlike C that returns quads using the EDX:EAX registers) or even allow any mention of it in this entry, clearly indicates that you are seeking to suppress this information. You assert that a thread dealiung with this subject in clear and precise language (quoted earlier) has expired due to its "age".

These two things are simply incompatible with your assertion that "we welcome criticism". Obviously you do not.

Once again, I have proved threads are deleted and powerbasic is sensitive to criticism.

The facts that 64bit signed quad integer values are returned in the st(0) register of the FPU also here and here, and that the FPU is used for signed 32 bit Integer calculations is not only relevant, but important. I agree that the distinction between a C compiler and Basic compiler is also relevant. The implications of this inconsitency are directly provable as pointed out earlier: "The value does not necessarily wrap beyond zero; instead, it's often truncated at zero." x??? = &hE1DDA73Cx2??? = (x??? * x???) This operation leaves x2??? = 0.

This is verifiable by any owner of the Powerbasic compiler in seconds and very relevant to the product in particular, and development in general. Since this pertains to the bahaviour of the compiler, as do all the features listed by the powerbasic company, it must meet the same burdon of proof, meaning the expression above is verifiable in exactly the same way as any of the claims made in the "Notable language features of 32-bit compilers"

How do you verify, for example, that "PowerBASIC programs are self-contained and do not require runtime files to execute."?

I submit that all these facts are verified in the same way, and that it is simply company vanity to include some but not others.

Statement of Fact
"Real World Experience" is a single purpose account, created to attack PowerBASIC, Inc. It appears he has no "edits" other than those which are antagonistic towards PowerBASIC. The actions of "Real World Experience" are plain and simple vandalism.

On Jan 30, 2008, a PowerBASIC Forum Administrator realized that this user was posting under a false identity, which was not allowed under forum policies in place for 12 years. The Admin asked this user to restrict posts to his real name in the future, just as done by thousands of other members.

In retaliation, the user began a vendetta against PowerBASIC, Inc. On Feb 3, 2008, be began a campaign of misinformation on the Free Basic BBS. When that received little support, he took the same misinformation to the VB Wire BBS. Now, he's brought the same tired arguments here, to Wikipedia.

1- "Real World Experience" said, "PowerBASIC currently has no clearly stated Privacy policy."

This is a fabrication. PowerBASIC has published a very definitive privacy policy for over eleven years.

2- "Real World Experience" then said, "Leaving aside the recent changes to the Powerbasic privacy policy in light of this dispute..."

This is another fabrication. The PowerBASIC Privacy Statement today has the same text as the Privacy Statement of August 23, 2000. Eight years ago. This fact can be verified here.

3- "Real World Experience" said, "There are currently no full time staff offering support."

That is a false, reckless, and slanderous statement with no validation of any kind. PowerBASIC has highly qualified, full time technicians who provide excellent technical support.

4- "Real World Experience" said, "Little, if any, official support is provided".

This is a fabrication. For many years, PowerBASIC has offered absolutely free, one-on-one, technical support by email. Paid support is only required when it involves custom programming, debugging of user programming errors, or custom research outside the bounds of the PowerBASIC compiler. This policy is virtually unmatched in the industry.

5- "Real World Experience" then said, "Little, if any, official support is provided in these forums."

This is a fabrication. A quick review of the active forums show that PowerBASIC employees have actually posted 18,771 messages in support of PowerBASIC customers. If archived forums were included, the total would be much higher. Of course, for serious support issues, PowerBASIC recommends that customers use free, one-on-one technical support instead.

6- "Real World Experience" said, "This situation is especially relevant for new users who may suddenly find themselves without access to any real support."

This is wild speculation intended to inflame and agitate the casual reader. It has no basis in fact, and is without merit. He is saying that some unknown future circumstances might arise where PowerBASIC might decide to withhold support from some unknown, yet to be identified person. It is nothing more than the writer's imagination about what might occur in the worst possible scenario at some undetermined future date. One might just as easily say "The moon might explode today". They have about an equal chance of occurring. The truth: "No licensed PowerBASIC customer has ever been refused support in the entire history of the company." The worst that might be said is that the very occasional abusive customer is delayed just a bit, at least until he regains composure.

7- "Real World Experience" said, "[sic] user's may also find their personal information disseminated".

This, too, is wild speculation and very reckless. Never, in the history of the company, has PowerBASIC ever released a customer's contact information. No mailing address. No email. No residence address. No telephone number. Not once. Of course, when you register for the PowerBASIC Forums, you authorize the use of your full real name, since it's a published item. And, in the case of "Real World Experience", he voluntarily and personally published his city of residence in every forum message.

8- "Real World Experience" said, "String functions MCase$ UCase$ LCase$ UCode$ ACode$ only handle the English alphabet".

This is a fabrication. Many years ago, it was true, as was very common in the era of DOS programming. However, the last five (5) versions of PowerBASIC for Windows and PowerBASIC Console Compiler have offered excellent support for international character sets.

9- "Real World Experience" said, "MCASE$ UCASE$...are slow compared to ASM routines commonly applied to these tasks".

We dispute this claim in its entirety, and respectfully note that he has provided absolutely no substantiation for his allegation. Frankly, we chuckled at the notion that an experienced programmer would believe assembler routines are commonly applied to these tasks. Visual Basic, his latest compiler of choice, does not even offer an assembler.

10- "Real World Experience" said, "I assert PowerBASIC staff are very sensitive to criticism".

This is a distasteful personal attack on the employees of PowerBASIC, Inc. It clearly has no place on Wikipedia.

11- "Real World Experience" said, "users are frequently banned."

This is false, reckless, and slanderous. Did he provide a count of banned users? Did he provide a list of banned users? What is his definition of the word "frequently"? Once again, he's using charged words in a distasteful attempt to denigrate a company with high ethical standards. Yes, we occasionally find it necessary to suspend a forum member. Yes, sometimes we find it necessary to delete a thread. Sometimes for piracy. Sometimes for abusive behavior. Sometimes for flooding posts. Sometimes for other valid reasons. With close to 300,000 messages posted, there will always be a few bad apples. But, that does not equate to "users are frequently banned". This has no place on Wikipedia.

It should be noted: Even after the egregious fabrications presented here by "Real World Experience", he is not banned from the PowerBASIC Forums.

12- "Real World Experience" said, "[sic] Becuase you link your forum to the Wikipedia entry and declare it the "official" forum, and because it is the offical repository of fact relative to the powerbasic product..."

This is a fabrication. The notation of an "official" forum was added by 63.157.90.231 on May 1, 2006. It has since been removed. The PowerBASIC Forums are Peer Support Forums, frequented by thousands of folks with widely varying needs and agendas. The vast majority of them are wonderful friends and customers, but your suggestion that PowerBASIC has deemed them to have created the "official repository of fact relative to the PowerBASIC product" is not correct. Even further, at this time, there isn't even a link to the PowerBASIC Forums on Wikipedia.

13- "Real World Experience" said, "Lance Edmonds, Administrator - 0 posts (This [sic] aministrator suddenly [sic] dissapeared in July 2004 with no explanation).

This is another fabrication. On Aug 18, 2004, the following message was posted on the PowerBASIC forums by Lance:

"Hi folks!" "Thanks all for the kind words! It was a real pleasure working for PowerBASIC and I do miss it, however life will continue in a different (and hopefully equally fulfilling) direction for me now! Anyway, I'm going to embark on some of my own software projects for the short term, and we'll see what develops from there.  In any case, I'm still an avid PowerBASIC programmer and supporter, so I will still be dropping by from time to time to put my 2-cents in."

14- "Real World Experience" said, "When you consider that there were 8508 posts asking for help..."

This is yet another fabrication. By his own words, earlier in the message, there were 8508 total posts, not 8508 requests for help. The number of requests for help would obviously be much lower than the total. It's clear this was re-phrased in order to twist his mathematical calculation to fit a result which matched his agenda. The result of that calculation was then posted to the PowerBASIC page without regard for the misinformation.

15- "Real World Experience" said, "it is quite clear from this post that support is an additional cost promoted via the forums"

This is yet one more fabrication. "Real World Experience" knows it is false, because he is the one who asked the original question on the PowerBASIC Forums. Our employees are experts on the PowerBASIC compiler. Our employees provide absolutely free technical support for questions about how to use the PowerBASIC compiler. But "Real World Experience" asked us a question about Microsoft Visual Basic, not PowerBASIC. "Real World Experience" had a program written in Visual Basic, and "Real World Experience" wanted to recreate its functionality in a PowerBASIC program. "Real World Experience" did not understand some of the statements and functions used in Visual Basic, and he wanted us to provide that information, or perhaps even write the PowerBASIC program for him. If our representative knew the quick answer to his Visual Basic problem, he would have certainly shared it. We do that every day. But, we are not Visual Basic experts. In order to answer the questions of "Real World Experience" about Visual Basic, or to write his program for him, we would have to do some fairly lengthy research on that product and his specific problem. That is very clear. It's also very clear that such research and custom programming is well beyond the scope of technical support from any company. Mr. Zale wrote a very polite, businesslike message to explain it fully.

PowerBASIC is a programming tool. It is used by programmers to create an application program. We sell the tool to create a program. We will help you by answering questions about the tool, but we can't create your programs for you, and we can't generally answer technical questions about other programming tools. That would be a lifetime consulting service. If one were to follow the somewhat twisted logic of "Real World Experience", you could:

A- Visit your Sears store and buy a hammer. B- Expect them to teach you to build a house or build a house for you. C- Expect them to teach you to use an air-hammer you bought elsewhere.

Of course, then Wikipedia Editors would have to go to the Sears page and:

A- Add an entry that Sears won't build you a house, even if you buy a hammer. B- Add an entry that Sears won't teach you to use tools bought elsewhere. C- Then move on to appliances, televisions, etc.

16- "Real World Experience" said, "little (less than 0.5 percent) official help is provided in the forums".

This is yet another fabricated claim. As explained earlier, the numbers used in the mathematical calculations were manipulated by "Real World Experience" in order to provide a result that matches his agenda. However, even if his mathematics were truthful, the entire statement is immaterial. The PowerBASIC Forums Registration Agreement advises each customer that: "This forum has been created for "Peer-to-Peer" questions and discussions.  While PowerBASIC employees may contribute, this forum is not a source of official support.". At PowerBASIC, we believe that free, one-on-one, technical support provides a much better result for most programming issues. Of course, it's still nice to know that PowerBASIC employees have contributed 18,771 forum posts in support of our valued customers.

17- "Real World Experience" said, "threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff".

This is a fabrication. It is not verified, it is not true, and it is not sourced. Original content is not allowed on Wikipedia pages.

18- "Real World Experience" said, "PowerBASIC differs from mainstream languages like C in a few respects, most notably in its use of the FPU for DWORD unsigned integer calculations. Since overloading an integer is fundamental to Encryption [sic]algorithm's in most languages, this presents a unique problem in PowerBASIC."

PowerBASIC is not a C compiler, and it does not attempt to emulate any particular C Compiler the writer has in mind. PowerBASIC is a PowerBASIC Compiler, a proprietary compiler built to the PowerBASIC specification. It is not built to a C specification, any more than a Chevrolet is built to a Nissan specification. In PowerBASIC, the results of a numeric overflow are undefined. The result of a stack overflow is undefined, as is the result of a buffer overflow. We believe it is prudent for the PowerBASIC programmer to write programs which avoid numeric overflow, stack overflow, and buffer overflow, too. This is a fairly straightforward concept for most programmers. Sometimes the result of an undefined operation still work as expected. But we suggest that counting on it is foolish, at best. The PowerBASIC documentation clearly states: "Note: PowerBASIC does not trap numeric overflow or underflow errors in equation and expression evaluation".  None of the claims of "Real World Experience" are verifiable, true, or sourced. Original content is not allowed on Wikipedia.


 * A- We dispute that BASIC is not a mainstream language. BASIC has more users than C.
 * B- We dispute that any alleged "differences" listed here, even if they were true, are most notable.
 * C- We dispute that overloading an integer is fundamental.
 * D- We dispute "...in most languages...".
 * E- We dispute that the FPU is never used in an integer calculation in any C compiler.
 * F- We dispute the notion that use of the FPU in never appropriate in an integer calculation.
 * G- We dispute the erroneous claim that PowerBASIC always uses the FPU in integer calculations.
 * H- We dispute that "...this presents a unique problem in PowerBASIC."
 * I- We dispute that this entire paragraph is pertinent.

PowerBASIC (talk) 10:40, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Repetition
You have deleted my editis in their entirity once again and pasted the same aguments you made earlier as justification. It should be noted that disputing a verifiable fact is not the same thing as disputing the verification. Following the steps I outlined anyone can verify for themselves the numbers I presented. Using the code I provided, anyone can verify the Integer issues. Simply stomping your feet by claiming you dispute this is not proof to the contrary!

It is also interesting to note that you finally registered after I suggested in a COI post that your refusal to do so is a clear indication of your contempt for the Wikipedia editing process.

I also notice that you post is at 6.40am (Florida Time) on Sunday April 20th. Since it seems unlikely that even the most conscientious employee would get out of bed in time to finish reading, editing and posting on Wikipedia by 6.40am on a SUNDAY, it seems fairly obvious that must be the work of the owner, Mr Zale. In fact, the consitency of these posts suggests that they are all the work of Mr. Zale who for some reason, feels that his life's work is in some way threatened by the few facts that I seek to respectfully present. If this isn't a clear case of Conflict of interest, I don't know what is. RealWorldExperience (talk) 18:22, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Endless Repetition
You really should note that you are engaging in unacceptable behavior according to official Wikipedia policy.

Specifically:
 * 1- No personal attacks - saying something negative about another person
 * 2- Never post personal details: Users who post what they believe are the personal details of other users without their consent may be blocked for any length of time, including indefinitely.
 * 3- Do not misrepresent other people.

I believe your statement of "...it seems fairly obvious that must be the work of the owner, Mr Zale..." is a blatant violation of item #2. You have posted what you believe are the personal details of another user without their consent.

I believe your statement of "I assert PowerBASIC staff are very sensitive to criticism and users are frequently banned." qualifies as a violation of item #1.

I believe your statement of "...these facts are being [sic] deliberatly withheld by powerbasic staff ..." qualifies as well.

I believe your statement of "...threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff..." qualifies as a violation of item #1.

Frankly, I believe there are so many violations of item #3, that I won't even try to copy them all. Just re-read this entire page.

As to newer issues, you attacked me with the unfounded allegation "You have deleted my [sic] editis in their [sic] entirity once again...". '''I have deleted nothing. PowerBASIC has deleted nothing.''' Your continuous fabrication of virtually anything is starting to wear down my good nature. Why would you do such a thing?

It should also be noted that you personally posted many links to your own postings on BBS's and forums. You have stated repeatedly that the name you used on those forums was an alias -- not your real name.

If I may offer a suggestion? Please read the Wiki pages?

Vassyana told you, "User forums and newsgroups are most certainly not reliable sources. Criticisms and other information must be verifiable in reputable references...."

FiveYears told you, "...Some of them dont comply with WP:EXTERNAL, next time when you add external links to a page, make sure that they comply with that policy..."

Gordonofcartoon told you, "I see you've also been told, endlessly, that forum postings are not acceptable as sources. But even if they were, the kind of thing you want to add is your personal synthesis of forum content (e.g. counts of support messages answered, and your assessment of the attitude to criticism there), and that's unusable per the no original research policy."

Also, you might check out your warning from Admin PhilKnight...

I sense a minor pattern here. Could that be true?

As to your invalid claim about differences in C and PowerBASIC -- Regardless of the untold number of reasons it can't be posted, add this one: To be fair and maintain a NPOV, you'd have to add the real notable differences. There are hundreds, maybe thousands. You could write a book on that topic.

Sock Puppet Editing
Are you seriously asking us to believe that an employee who has signed the previous posts as "Tim Robbins" would be busily working away on a Wikipedia page at 6am on a Sunday morning? It is only logical to assume that perhaps someone that feels personally invested in this product, like say the owner, is probably trying to hide behind an employee (real or imagined). A quick visit to the powerbasic website reveals the identity of that person... Mr Zale, the same person that signed all 48 of his forum "support" contributions in the last six months. You have clearly demonstrated conflict of interest over and over again and should be prevented from editing this wikipedia entry.

Since you seek to add more of the differences between C and powerbasic, I won't object. Please remember to include the fundamentally significant items like utterly different data types (verified above)

It is also ludicrous to assert that this thread (available here) relating to the unsigned integer incompatabilites, has not been deleted. Try clicking on it. Its just not there. Your claim that it just somehow died of old "age" is ridiculous.

You are clearly engaged in a systematic program of editing, contrary to the Wikipedia COI rules. RealWorldExperience (talk) 00:22, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Fabrications
I'm asking you to believe that you are engaging in unacceptable behavior according to official Wikipedia policy.

As to your famous thread, I've asserted nothing. I have absolutely no idea if it was deleted or not. If it was deleted, I certainly have no idea why... I suppose a forum administrator might have deleted it. If so, there must have been a reason. I suppose the forum member who started the thread might have deleted it. Maybe it even had something to do with the new forum software that was installed a few months ago. There are any number of possibilities... even the possibility that you are fabricating it.

But one thing is dead certain: You don't know what happened either.  Yet you continue to engage in wild speculation, then you treat that imagination of yours as though it were fact. That's fairly ugly.

One other thing is dead certain: I'm not your personal concierge, so I won't be doing your research for you. If you have a question about a PowerBASIC Forum thread, why don't you ask instead of fabricating? You can write to PowerBASIC Customer Service at: 2100 Tamiami Trail South, Venice, FL 34293.

An Extended Suggestion
If I may offer an extended suggestion to Real World Experience? Please read the Wiki pages?

Vassyana told you, "User forums and newsgroups are most certainly not reliable sources. Criticisms and other information must be verifiable in reputable references...."

FiveYears told you, "...Some of them dont comply with WP:EXTERNAL, next time when you add external links to a page, make sure that they comply with that policy..."

Gordonofcartoon told you, "I see you've also been told, endlessly, that forum postings are not acceptable as sources. But even if they were, the kind of thing you want to add is your personal synthesis of forum content (e.g. counts of support messages answered, and your assessment of the attitude to criticism there), and that's unusable per the no original research policy."

Also, you might check out your warning from Admin PhilKnight...

Gordonofcartoon also told you, "Yes, but even if we accept the reliability of the source, you are making a novel and personal selection of that material in support of arguing a point: so it's both original research and WP:SOAP."

AecisBrievenbus told you, "RealWorldExperience, it appears you have an axe to grind with PowerBASIC. That is something between you and the company, and it's something that should remain between you and the company. Wikipedia is neither a soapbox nor a blog or a free webspace provider. Information on Wikipedia should be verifiable from reliable sources. We are not in the business of revealing embarrassing or inconvenient TruthsTM."

EdJohnston told you, "I agree with other commenters above that RealWorldExperience's deductions from the PowerBASIC forum postings don't belong in the article..."

I sense a minor pattern here. Could that be true? —Preceding unsigned comment added by PowerBASIC (talk • contribs) 08:47, 21 April, 2007 (UTC)

Conflict of interest
Sir, YOU are the forum administrator. You own the forum and the servers it is hosted on. You (and your employees that are accountable to you) are the only ones with administrator rights. You ultimately are responsible for any content changes and you (powerbasic et al) deleted that thread (as well as many others). While I cannot prove why you deleted it, as that goes to your state of mind, it is irrelevant. The fact remains that it WAS deleted. That is not speculation as one click here shows.

It is also clear that this thread dealt exclusivly with one of the well documented issues that you are seeking to keep from public view; namely Powerbasics use of the FPU for integer operations. If untrue, please state clearly that Powerbasic does not use the FPU for these operations? You cannot. Hence this is FACT that should be included in any complete entry regarding Powerbasic.

Editing content under the name of "Tim Robbins" is also contrary to Wikipedia policy. While I cannot prove that the owner is busily working away from home at 6am on a Sunday morning, it seems very ulikely that an employee would have repoted your office in Venice, FL at 6am. Of course you could allways submit a sworn afadvit and prove the contrary.

Regarless, this level of effort by your company to manage this wikipedia entry is in itself proof of a flagrant violation of Wikipedias Conflict of Interest policy.

If you are going to quote a response on the Conflict Of interest noticeboard at least qoute the whole thing. "I agree with other commenters above that RealWorldExperience's deductions from the PowerBASIC forum postings don't belong in the article. But the article at present is one-sidedly positive about PowerBASIC. This is a product which has been out for many years, and you would expect it must have been reviewed many times in the trade press. Presumably these reviews are not uniformly positive, and if we read them, we could create a more balanced picture. PowerBASIC, due to its longevity, may in fact be 'behind the curve', and you wonder if it can handle the range of tasks addressed by more recent languages that run on Windows. (What about Visual Basic?). I hope that we could answer some of these questions for our readers, but this would require some kind soul to actually dig up references and work on the article."

Your I can only hope we get an admin with some computer science background to spend a little time on this, then I can work on contributing other content rather than standing up to a tendentious company owner. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RealWorldExperience (talk • contribs) 19:23, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Medcab
Despite any COI issues, I just want to know if there are any current problems with the article. Medcab only mediates content disputes. Is there any content dispute atm that needs to be addressed? Xavexgoem (talk) 21:06, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Apart from a need to find third-party sourcing, which is being addressed, I don't think there is a content problem; I think the Mediation was invoked on tendentious grounds. User:RealWorldExperience is an SPA focused on trying to introduce hostile material to this article based on a user forum. He has been repeatedly advised by independent editors that this is an unreliable source and that even if it weren't, his analysis of it (e.g. counting posts replied to by support staff) is original research. See WP:COIN. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 22:02, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I understand his worry, however; PowerBASIC is an SPA, too (no offense intended to either :-) )
 * With that said, I'm going to close the case, but remain here incase of sourcing/OR disputes. Does that sound OK to everyone? this is largely because the medcab case page has gotten REALLY bloated :-p Xavexgoem (talk) 22:26, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I agree also about his worry; but nobody AFAIK has assumed the OR problem invalidates the concern over COI edits on behalf of PowerBASIC. That side of things is being tackled: I've mentioned at WP:COIN the problem of a username "PowerBASIC" being a role account, and have been among those suggesting it'd be helpful if whoever is representing PowerBASIC could stick to one registered account. They've said they'll help with supplying sources, which is fine. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 23:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * The content of this article is now 100% accurate. All of the hostile content has been removed.  Thank you. PowerCoder (talk) 15:49, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The content of this article is missing any mention of the issues that the Powerbasic company seeks to keep from public view. They are as valid as any of the other facts about this product. This entry is identical to Day 1. It once again contains a link to the powerbasic company user forum and nothing else despite the owners statement earlier "Even further, at this time, there isn't even a link to the PowerBASIC Forums on Wikipedia." added by "GordonOfCartoon" who is quite obviously now a agent acting in support of the Powerbasic company. RealWorldExperience (talk) 00:12, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * If something isn't in the public view, it can't be sourced anyway... I'm thinking this isn't the case? Xavexgoem (talk) 01:02, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, he's fabricating this information, too. The link in the PowerBASIC article is to the PowerBASIC Home Page at www.powerbasic.com, not to the PowerBASIC Forums.PowerCoder (talk) 09:20, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it should be further noted that this very page (PowerBASIC Discussion) includes at least 76 paragraphs, authored by Real World Experience, which contain fabricated, hostile slander directed towards PowerBASIC. It's my understanding that Wikipedia policies require that discussion pages follow all the same rules as main articles, even if not quite to the same degree.  It's becoming increasingly clear that he's using this page, as well, to reach his "goals".PowerCoder (talk) 10:14, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Some here have noticed that Real World Experience may not be a newcomer with a sincere wish for mentoring. A quick review of his mentoring page reveals that he contributed 36 paragraphs of text communicating with his mentor.  Of those 36 paragraphs, 27 paragraphs were either hostile towards PowerBASIC, or seeking help with better ways to push his point of view in the dispute process.PowerCoder (talk) 10:35, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Let's not get dragged into hypotheticals. If he is new, he can be made a better editor :-D
 * I stand by what I'd originally said: "If something isn't in public view, it can't be sourced". Any criticism needs to be sourced, and would need to have due weight within the article. Xavexgoem (talk) 13:09, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * That may indeed be correct... An assessment of his mentoring page may be subjective. But it's very difficult to overlook 76 paragraphs of false statements. Repeated over and over and... PowerCoder (talk) 14:41, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Its difficult to look over that youre only commenting on RealWorldExperience, not the content at hand and turning this discussion from a discussion about a very pro-PowerBASIC article, with major concerns about COI editors to a discussion about him. It may also be worth noting that all of your edits are related to PowerBASIC. Five Years 14:59, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * The content at hand involves 76 paragraphs of false allegations. Have you read them?PowerCoder (talk) 15:34, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

← Yes, there could be a conflict of interest. Forget about that for the moment, and focus on the article. If there is strong-arming going on, report it to the noticeboard. But for the moment, we're all talk and no article, so to speak. Xavexgoem (talk) 15:14, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Im pretty convinced that there is. It appears clear from the discussions that various people associated with the company are editing the article. Im not going to report it to ANI, im just going to keep a close monitor on it. Five Years 15:28, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * As I mentioned earlier, I believe the article is finally very accurate. The only thing that seemed to get the discussion off track  was another fabrication about a link on the page.  PowerCoder (talk) 15:43, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * What I want to know is what RealWorldExperience wants to add, the editors involved notwithstanding. How do we make this article better? Xavexgoem (talk) 15:52, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * At the risk of giving his crusade even more publicity, here are a few examples of what he has already posted. All without a shred of evidence, sourcing, or verification. "PowerBASIC staff are very sensitive to criticism." - "Users are frequently banned for challenging PowerBASIC philosophy or criticizing the product and threads are deleted by staff." - "This situation renders PowerBASIC a poor choice for new users." - "[sic] user's may also find their personal information disseminated"."  Of course, a review of this page and the history page will reveal much. PowerCoder (talk) 16:16, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Hes a newbie, leave him be. Hes been told he cant do that and hes learned from his mistake. Now, PowerCoder, youre yet to make a single main-space edit. What plans do you have for your time on wikipedia apart from hounding this talk page and closely-related pages? Five Years 16:33, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * He may have been told "he can't do that", but he seems to forget quickly. Learned from his mistakes? Just this morning, he posted yet another fabrication right here in this discussion forum (false information about links). I am here for one reason only:  Gordonofcartoon requested assistance from a representative of PowerBASIC to provide him with some factual information about the company and the product.  We're accumulating that for him right now. PowerCoder (talk) 16:49, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Five Years: PowerCoder, you're yet to make a single main-space edit
 * Powercoder is doing what has been asked: as a representative of PowerBASIC, setting up a consistent registered non-role account to help source this particular article via the Talk page. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 17:25, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

To answer the question "What I want to know is what RealWorldExperience wants to add?":

1. Unsigned 32bit Integer (DWORD) calculations are executed in the FPU - unlike mainstream (Microsoft et al) compilers - causing unexpected results

2. 64bit signed (QUAD) integer values are returned in st(0) of the FPU (unlike C that returns quads using the EDX:EAX registers) once again, an unexpected result.

3. Powerbasic "support" forums require the use of your full real name

4. The "support" forums are in fact "user to user" forums. Company support must be paid for.

5. "Support" forum threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff.

6. Users have been banned from the "support" forums

7. ASM implementation is limited (less than the full set of commands)

8. COM implementation is limited (less than the full functionality)

9. Compiler upgrades can require all existing code be changed

10. External links to other web sites and forums with substantial contributions of code in the Powerbasic language. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RealWorldExperience (talk • contribs) 22:46, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

I have proved all of these in extensive detail above (You will notice Powerbasic is careful not to deny the accuracy of 1 and 2 specifically). I remain open to suggestions for a fair and accurate way to word these facts. Since these facts can be verified by anyone in the same way that all the other claims about the performance of the compiler made by the company are, why should they be excluded? RealWorldExperience (talk) 20:16, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * So it has some FPU issues, support problems (doesn't this reflect more on the company, not the language?), and limited implementation of ASM & COM. Are there any technology journals or other publications that say these are notable issues? And is it fair to include them? Xavexgoem (talk) 20:22, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Well therein lies the contention. I submit that if any features of the product are relevant, like the ones that have been included by the company for example; Extended precision floating point calculation (80-bit/18 digit), Pointers with multiple levels of indirection, Run-Time libraries and DLLs are not required etc etc (which I do not dispute), then ALL the features of the product are relevant. The Powerbasic company does not agree.

I submit that their fierce attempts to prevent these facts from being disemintated (deleting threads on their forum and micro managing the content of this entry) are borne from a marketing strategy and not from accuracy. I submit that the use of the FPU (designed for floating point calculations) for integer calculations, is significant information for any developer considering this product. The QUAD use of the FPU also. (discussed in much more detail with examples above)

I submit that the issues surrounding the "support" forums are also very significant when choosing a compiler. New users are completely reliant upon these channels for education. Every basic compiler has a user forum for this reason. Requiring a customer use his full real name when registering to utilize products "official" channel of "support", is extreemly important information for people that may not be in a position to do so. This requirement is an unexpected exception to the normal practice of using a handle for posting.

"is it fair to include them?" That is for you all to decide. I will be happy if the issues are at least given real consideration. RealWorldExperience (talk) 21:11, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

1. Unsigned 32bit Integer (DWORD) calculations are executed in the FPU - unlike mainstream (Microsoft et al) compilers - causing unexpected results .a) Unsourced. .b) Some calculations are performed in the FPU, just as in other compilers. .c) It does not cause unexpected results. The claim is unsourced and untrue. .d) BASIC is a mainstream compiler. There are more BASIC programmers than C programmers.

2. 64bit signed (QUAD) integer values are returned in st(0) of the FPU (unlike C that returns quads using the EDX:EAX registers) once again, an unexpected result. .a) Unsourced. .b) PowerBASIC is a BASIC compiler, not a C compiler. They use different calling conventions by design. This is documented elsewhere on Wikipedia.

3. Powerbasic "support" forums require the use of your full real name .a) While this is true, you should note that all references to the PowerBASIC Forums were removed from the PowerBASIC article by a Wikipedia Admin. The pertinence of this minor item would therefore be quite a "stretch".

4. The "support" forums are in fact "user to user" forums. Company support must be paid for. .a) This is one more fabrication. "Real World Experience" knows it is false, because he is the one who asked the original question on the PowerBASIC Forums. Our employees are experts on the PowerBASIC compiler. Our employees provide absolutely free technical support for questions about how to use the PowerBASIC compiler. But "Real World Experience" asked us a question about Microsoft Visual Basic, not PowerBASIC. "Real World Experience" had a program written in Visual Basic, and "Real World Experience" wanted to recreate its functionality in a PowerBASIC program. "Real World Experience" did not understand some of the statements and functions used in Visual Basic, and he wanted us to provide that information, or perhaps even write the PowerBASIC program for him. If our representative knew the quick answer to his Visual Basic problem, he would have certainly shared it. We do that every day. But, we are not Visual Basic experts. In order to answer the questions of "Real World Experience" about Visual Basic, or to write his program for him, we would have to do some fairly lengthy research on that product and his specific problem. That is very clear. It's also very clear that such research and custom programming is well beyond the scope of technical support from any company. Mr. Zale wrote a very polite, businesslike message to explain it fully.

PowerBASIC is a programming tool. It is used by programmers to create an application program. We sell the tool to create a program. We will help you by answering questions about the tool, but we can't create your programs for you, and we can't generally answer technical questions about other programming tools. That would be a lifetime consulting service. If one were to follow the somewhat twisted logic of "Real World Experience", you could:

A- Visit your Sears store and buy a hammer. B- Expect them to teach you to build a house or build a house for you. C- Expect them to teach you to use an air-hammer you bought elsewhere.

Of course, then Wikipedia Editors would have to go to the Sears page and:

A- Add an entry that Sears won't build you a house, even if you buy a hammer. B- Add an entry that Sears won't teach you to use tools bought elsewhere. C- Then move on to appliances, televisions, etc.

5. "Support" forum threads are targeted and deleted by Powerbasic staff. .a) Unsourced .b) Total fabrication.

6. Users have been banned from the "support" forums .a) Over the past 12 years, a few users have been banned for cause. Wikipedia has banned some users, too.  Pertinence?

7. ASM implementation is limited (less than the full set of commands) .a) Unsourced

8. COM implementation is limited (less than the full functionality) .a) This is already documented clearly in the PowerBASIC Wikipedia article. It says "COM (component object model) client functions.  No claim is made for server functions in the current version of PowerBASIC. PowerCoder (talk) 21:22, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Real World Experience said, "Requiring a customer use his full real name when registering to utilize products "official" channel of "support", is [sic] extreemly important information for people that may not be in a position to do so. This requirement is an unexpected exception to the normal practice of using a handle for posting."

This is yet another outright fabrication. He knows it is false because he agreed to the PowerBASIC Forum Agreement when he registered, and he even linked to it in his fabricated claim. See for yourself.

The PowerBASIC agreement includes: This forum has been created for "Peer-to-Peer" questions and discussions. While PowerBASIC employees may contribute, this forum is not a source of official support."

Official support is free, one-on-one, technical support by email. PowerCoder (talk) 21:34, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrary break
Well, I've got lots to work with! :-) Could a potential compromise (for the article) be a source for #7 (ASM), and a clarification of #8 (no server-side)? Xavexgoem (talk) 22:29, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Could a potential compromise
 * Could we just get a grip on policy? No original research. Everything on Wikipedia requires prior publication from a reliable third party source. Online forums are out. Deductions from the content of an online forum are out. I can't imagine why you're encouraging this line of discussion, which is based on an entirely tendentious presence on Wikipedia anyway. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 01:20, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Of course! It's just my thinking that if there is a legitimate complaint within the user base as RealWorldExperience attests to (whether or not he's alone in this I don't know, which brings me to my next point:) and there is a reliable, third-party source, preferably within technology journals (etc), then perhaps it's worthy of inclusion. I don't know to what extent ASM is faulty, although I believe adding the non-server-side bits of COM is worthy simply because it good information and adds detail (but maybe that's just me?). I try to avoid pattering off the WP:s (because of WP:BEANS and all that potentially entails), but here I go!
 * All info to be included within the article must be reliably sourced (not conjectured), and must receive only its due weight within the article so to remain neutral to the topic at large... which is a brand of BASIC with features and flaws like everything else under the sun. There! :-) Xavexgoem (talk) 01:57, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
 * So I suppose what I should be asking is: are there reliable, third-party sources from major technology publications that attest to some of these claims? Xavexgoem (talk) 02:10, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

GordonOfCartoon's argument is only valid if a superficial statement like "Online forums are out" is taken at face value. I am not suggesting that opinions from a forum be used, only the compilable code from the forum posts and signed, dated statements by the owner. The code's validity is self evident. It produces identical results on EVERY compiler out there.

If GordonOfCartoon were really concerned about policy, I would expect to be hearing the more about the VERY specific language regarding Conflict of Interest.

As I mentioned on the COI page, I have argued in detail, there never will be a article published in "main stream" media about the technical details of a minor software compiler like Powerbasic or any other brand of basic for that matter.

Printed media in general has suffered severely as a result of the internet and caters only to the interests of large groups of people. No technology journal is going to delve into the details of each compiler out there, they would have to devote hundreds of hours to the project, and who would buy it anyway with the free forum's available? If you follow that line of thinking then NOTHING about the product is verifiable. If that's true the whole article should be stripped to a stub (as one person suggested). That serves no one. The purpose here is to provide complete information about the product, the pro's and the con's...

However, the Wikipedia criteria for verification goes on to say: "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field..." I am arguing that signed, dated statements made by the owner of Powerbasic (via a wholly owned and run forum), who CREATED the product in the first place, are about as reliable a source for information as I can imagine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RealWorldExperience (talk • contribs) 09:51, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
 * As I mentioned on the COI page, I have argued in detail, there never will be a article published in "main stream" media about the technical details of a minor software compiler like Powerbasic or any other brand of basic for that matter.
 * Wrong. Perhaps not mainstream in the non-technical genre sense, but it's been reviewed in PC Magazine in September 1993 (we're just looking for the precise citation), and Dr Dobb's Journal (see here - The Power in PowerBASIC Bruce W. Tonkin, July 1990, and Examining The (PowerBASIC} Developer Kit, Raymond J. Schneider, March 1995). Finding those reviews would be good.
 * And the conflict of interest issues are, as I said previously, being dealt with: anyone from PowerBASIC is now collaborating according to the standard advice in WP:COI. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 12:50, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

1990 was 18 years ago! The products have changed significantly since then. I don't think the flagship product, powerbasic for windows, was even released then, and if it was, it's so different today its not relevant. RealWorldExperience (talk) 19:27, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

RealWorld, are you going to edit the article? Xavexgoem (talk) 19:11, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Probably not right now. It seems to enflame Powerbasic. My efforts are immeditely deleted. I admit my wording could be improved so for now I am waiting to see how these issues are viewed by editors with more experience. RealWorldExperience (talk) 19:27, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Have you considered editing other articles of interest to you? You have programming skill, no? There are loads of other articles out there to edit :-) Xavexgoem (talk) 19:53, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I have been editing technical articles, including other flavors of basic compilers.

The problem is that we live in an age where technical details cannot reliably be referenced from print. I believe this Wikipedia entry has become a watershed for what I hope will become some more up to date, relevant standards by which to determine technical accuracy for the benefit of all visitors. The problem is NOT unique to powerbasic. In my study of entries for many products, all the way up to mainstream Microsoft compilers, the verification is debatable at best. The concern I must address is that tt does not make a lot of sense for me to add significant content borne from years of study if it is going to be deleted because the "PC Magazine" didn't print an article about it.

Even articles on subjects that have wide reach in our technological world. like for example cryptography, it is doubtful you will find the details of the schema in print, yet this is a product that US Govt prohibits from export to certain countries and is used for classified information. The amount of time it would take to cover any of the details of a software product like this in significant detail would be cost prohibitive and editorial suicide. Due to time/budget constraints, writers generally just quote the press release in front of them written by the company that created the product. Only when it rises to the level of something like Windows Vista will you see articles discussing technical details that are INTRINSIC to the product.

I suspect Wikipedia has been lucky thus far that people versed in this level of technical knowledge are generally all on the same page and so few "tooth and nail" contests have surfaced. The guiding principals of Wikipedia, particularly the deference to accuracy and truth tend to lead the way. If another editor challenged a contribution I made to an entry like that, I would want to be darn sure I am correct and would check and recheck until I was either able to verify or show contrary results.

In this way people interested in the technical aspects of something like a cryptographic cypher would be able to outline its nature. Because the nature of a product like this is INTRINSIC to the product, this is not original research. It is like making the statement "gasoline can burn when ignited". If you imagine for a moment gasoline is a esoteric product that few people have even seen, and of those, most are not interested enough, don't have the time or have never thought of dropping a match on it, then it becomes clear that the resulting combustion is not original research, but one of the INTRINSIC natures of gasoline.

As it turns out, a few people have dropped a match on the gasoline, and as you or anyone else can instantly verify (code linked above) the results might lead you to determine that you wished you had not chosen gasoline to clean the BBQ with! It is however an excellent choice for other things. This is what I would like to learn by reading a Wikipedia article on the subject.

I was thrilled when I first found substantial technical information on Wikipedia. For the first time we have a source of information that has the potential for presenting a neutral and complete picture. For the most part, the people involved will be able to work with each other and build on the accuracy and completeness, but as we are seeing, this is not allways so.

I remain open to suggestions for integrating technical information that is disputed, but I submit that the current requirement's strong emphasis on print media is less relevant and going to be become a significant problem for Wikipedia. As pointed out by Powerbasic, if it is rigorously applied, from what I have seen, you will need to delete a substantial amount of technical information from many many articles. This serves no one.

What should be done and what can be done are not things I can answer as I am new here, but if this article is dismissed as a problem child without addressing these issues, the problem will still remain and will simply resurface in another article at a later time. RealWorldExperience (talk) 02:00, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Indeed! :-) I'm glad to see so much enthusiasm from a new editor :-)
 * The threshold for inclusion is, of course, verifiability and not truth. That policy (WP:V) serves more to prevent conflicts than to actually verify information (in my mind, at least). I'm sure you've been around to many of the technical articles (particularly for languages and OSs) on WP, and many of them don't have sources for some of the more complex claims. But no-one is complaining. Were someone to complain, you'd give a source to prove the claim; if you couldn't provide a source, it would be subject to removal by the offended party. In short: policy is geared for editors more than it is for readers (aside from WP:NPOV, which is a foundation issue).
 * That's why I'm stressing secondary sources, which should alleviate some of the tension. They do not need to be print media. So long as the source is reliable (not off of a blog of personal website, for instance), they should be considered for inclusion. Xavexgoem (talk) 02:22, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * It'd probably be better to take this verifiability issue to Wikipedia talk:Verifiability where, I suspect, they've heard this line of argument before and could advise. As far as I understand it, this kind of "personal verification" argument doesn't wash.
 * That policy (WP:V) serves more to prevent conflicts than to actually verify information (in my mind, at least)
 * Far from it. As said at WP:V, it's one of the three core policies. It exists because of the open anonymous editing system - we can't know or trust who supplies material (the normal test of authority for sourcing), so the test of authority lies in where the material was previously published. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 03:04, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Exactly. And it's the who who must provide the source :-) Two sides of the same coin, I guess Xavexgoem (talk) 03:08, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh, by the way, a number of wrong assumptions here:
 * I submit that the current requirement's strong emphasis on print media is less relevant and going to be become a significant problem for Wikipedia. As pointed out by Powerbasic, if it is rigorously applied, from what I have seen, you will need to delete a substantial amount of technical information from many many articles.
 * As you say, online sources are fine, as long as they're the kind of online sources held to be reliable per WP:V and WP:RS. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 03:30, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm confused. What's the wrong assumption? (Did I do something? :-/) Xavexgoem (talk) 03:36, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Sorry, not your assumption! As said below, RealWorldExperience's comment about there being an emphasis on print sources. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 10:58, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

I think Gordon is referring to my comment that a significant problem exists for this general category of specialized technical information. I took your suggestion and made the argument for using code to verify technical details in software. Excluding that method, I don't know how you can verify anything for a product like this. An 18yo article in a computer magazine based on information probably supplied by the vendor, hardly seems appropriate. At some point it would seem obvious that credible on line sources will become acceptable. I think I could fairly easily present a case that, by default, they already are. RealWorldExperience (talk) 10:37, 29 April 2008 (UTC)