The making of ABC

ABC is written in MS Visual Basic 6 (or Classic VB as it is now called since MS brought out Visual Basic NET). It also uses a few libraries of functions purchased from other companies -- the Excel compatible spreadsheet is an example. The user interface like MS Office is licensed from Microsoft.

The ABC Source Code consists of over 550 thousand lines of code (we wistfully remember the early days of computing when programmers were paid a pound per line).

How do we find our way around all this stuff? Well the internet means we can swap information and send tasks to people anywhere in the world instantly. Support Forums answer our stupid questions (fortunately we can remain anonymous....) and in return we help others with odd programming problems. Bits of ABC were written by people in Australia, America, Holland, Germany, India, and of course Lancashire. Most of these workers we've never met in person.

Starting in 2025 we have started using AI (Artificial Intelligence) to help with coding. It is very good at answering technical questions that in the past we had to search books for (see photo of just some of the books we never use these days). However, AI sometimes gets it wrong or leads us to a complicated solution (when a much easier one is available), so we have to always check and test.