Julio Merino reflects on six years building EndBASIC and asks whether its Rust VM, cross-platform console, and virtual file system are more valuable than the BASIC dialect itself.
Key Takeaways
The EndBASIC core is a pure, side-effect-free Rust VM with no built-in commands; even PRINT and INPUT live outside the core crate.
The console layer targets terminals (crossterm), SDL, HTML5 canvas, NetBSD wscons framebuffer, and SPI LCDs from a single abstraction.
The virtual file system supports memory, read-only binary blobs, host directories, browser localStorage, and a cloud REST API as interchangeable drives.
The EndBOX platform is a NetBSD-based buildroot alternative that boots a Rust app to graphics in seconds, with a privileged RPC daemon for sandboxed escalation.
Merino is actively rewriting the core language (v0.12 imminent) and eyeing Lua, Lisp/Scheme replacements, or positioning EndBASIC as a vibe-coding target for AI agents.
