In some other good comments Wirt said:

>BASIC has the easiest to use, most robust IMAGE
>interface of all of the languages on the HP3000.

It's not very often I have to disagree with Wirt....  But I
can't let this one pass:   With respect to ease of use;
au contraire:  Transact/iX has the best Image interface,
in my not-at-all-humble opinion !!!.....  :-)     And I might
add that the SIGRAPID Executive Committee has fairly
good reason to hope that it will be getting even better in
the near future (come to SIGRAPID at HP World - Chicago
if you are interested).

And then on the serious subject at hand:

>I can't think of a better way to accomplish that than to
>have a simple, high-speed, reliable language like BASIC
>be available to everyone, especially if the alternative is to
>simply abandon both of the languages.

Per Heather Goudey's last post and the "Category C" list
on HP's web site, support for BASIC/V and a long list of
other CM systems on MPE/iX will be ongoing...

Ken Sletten