Editing Blitz BASIC (section)

===BlitzMax===
{{Infobox programming language
| name = BlitzMax
| logo = 
| paradigm = [[imperative programming|imperative]], [[object-oriented programming|object-oriented]], [[modular programming|modular]], [[reflection (computer programming)|reflective]]
| year = 2004
| designer = Mark Sibly
| developer = Blitz Research
| discontinued = Yes
| latest release version = 1.51
| latest release date = {{Start date and age|df=yes|2015|09|21}}
| typing = [[Static typing|Static]], [[Weak typing|Weak]], [[Strong typing|Strong]] (optional)
| implementations = 
| dialects = Official BlitzMax, bmx-ng
| influenced_by = BlitzBasic
| influenced = Monkey
| operating_system = [[Windows]], [[Mac OS X]], [[Linux]]
}}

The first BlitzMax compiler was released in December 2004 for [[Mac OS X]]. This made it the first Blitz dialect that could be compiled on *nix platforms. Compilers for Microsoft Windows and [[Linux]] were subsequently released in May 2005. BlitzMax brought the largest change of language structure to the modern range of Blitz products by extending the type system to include object-oriented concepts and modifying the graphics API to better suit [[OpenGL]]. BlitzMax was also the first of the Blitz languages to represent strings internally using [[UCS-2]], allowing native-support for string literals composed of non-[[ASCII]] characters.

BlitzMax's platform-agnostic command-set allows developers to compile and run source code on multiple platforms. However the official compiler and build chain will only generate binaries for the platform that it is executing on. Unofficially, users have been able to get Linux and Mac OS X to cross-compile to the Windows platform.

BlitzMax is also the first [[modular programming|modular]] version of the Blitz languages, improving the extensibility of the command-set. In addition, all of the standard modules shipped with the compiler are open-source and so can be tweaked and recompiled by the programmer if necessary. The official BlitzMax [[cross-platform]] [[graphical user interface|GUI]] module (known as MaxGUI) allows developers to write GUI interfaces for their applications on Linux ([[FLTK]]), Mac ([[Cocoa (API)|Cocoa]]) and Windows. Various user-contributed modules extend the use of the language by wrapping such libraries as [[wxWidgets]], [[Cairo (graphics)|Cairo]], and [[Fontconfig]] as well as a selection of database modules. There are also a selection of third-party 3D modules available namely MiniB3D<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/topics.php?forum=119|title=Blitz News|website=www.blitzbasic.com|access-date=12 December 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080126114117/http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/topics.php?forum=119|archive-date=26 January 2008|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}</ref> - an open-source OpenGL engine which can be compiled and used on all three of BlitzMax's supported platforms.

In October 2007, BlitzMax 1.26 was released which included the addition of a [[reflection (computer programming)|reflection]] module.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=72891#814878|title=BlitzMax update 1.26 now available!|website=www.blitzbasic.com|access-date=11 January 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110526130312/http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=72891#814878|archive-date=26 May 2011|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}</ref> BlitzMax 1.32 shipped new [[thread (computing)|threading]] and [[Lua (programming language)|Lua]] scripting modules and most of the standard library functions have been updated so that they are [[unicode]] friendly.<ref>[http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=83917#947391 BlitzMax V132 for Windows and MacIntel now up!] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110526130325/http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=83917#947391 |date=26 May 2011}} on blitzbasic.com</ref>