Tools & Environment Setup

3.1 Installing QB64 Phoenix Edition

Go to the QB64-PE releases page on GitHub (search "QB64 Phoenix Edition releases") or qb64phoenix.com.

Download the package for your operating system.

Windows: extract the ZIP to a folder you own (for example C:\QB64PE) — not *Program Files* — and run qb64pe.exe. The C++ compiler is bundled.

Linux: extract the archive and run ./setup_lnx.sh. It installs dependencies (a C++ compiler, OpenGL and ALSA development packages) through your package manager and builds QB64-PE.

macOS: install the Xcode command-line tools (xcode-select --install), extract the archive, and run setup_osx.command.

The IDE opens with a blue QBasic-style editor. Type a program and press F5 to compile and run.

Useful IDE keys:

Compile and run Compile only (make executable) Help on the keyword under the cursor List of SUBs and FUNCTIONs Ctrl+F / Ctrl+H Find / Replace

Step over / step into (debug mode, when enabled) The QB64-PE wiki (built into the IDE via F1, and online) documents every keyword. Underscore-prefixed keywords such as _NEWIMAGE are QB64 extensions; plain keywords are QBasic-compatible.

3.2 Command-line compilation

qb64pe -x hello.bas -o hello        # compile from the command line, output executable "hello"
qb64pe -c hello.bas                 # compile (shows a compile window)

3.3 Installing FreeBASIC

Download from freebasic.net (Windows installer/ZIP, Linux tarball, DOS build). Many Linux distributions also package it.

Compile from a terminal:

Editors: FBIde, WinFBE (Windows), Geany or VS Code with a FreeBASIC extension.

fbc hello.bas                 # creates hello.exe (Windows) or ./hello (Linux)
fbc -lang qb oldprog.bas      # QuickBASIC compatibility mode (suffixes, GOSUB, implicit variables)
fbc -s gui game.bas           # Windows: no console window
fbc -g -exx prog.bas          # debug info + runtime checks (array bounds, null pointers)

3.4 Other tools

Free GW-BASIC/BASICA-compatible interpreter (Python) for running classic programs DOSBox / DOSBox-X

Run original QBasic 1.1 and QuickBASIC 4.5 VICE, Fuse, BeebEm, AppleWin

Emulators for C64, ZX Spectrum, BBC Micro, Apple II .NET SDK + Visual Studio / VS Code Visual Basic.NET Microsoft Excel (Alt+F11) Small Basic desktop or online Microsoft Small Basic

Syntax highlighting for QB64, FreeBASIC, VB.NET via extensions