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BASIC-256 for Linux

Two ways to run the same program: a single-file AppImage, or a tarball you unpack where you like. Take one — you do not need both.

v2.1.0 • released Aug 13, 2026 — see this release on GitHub ↗

Choose your download

Linux AppImage (x86_64)

Recommended

One file, no installation. Make it executable and run it — nothing is written outside the folder you keep it in.

Download

BASIC256-Linux-x86_64.AppImage 119.2 MB

Linux tar.gz (x86_64)

The same program as an ordinary directory, for when you would rather see the files or place them yourself.

Download

BASIC256-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz 132.2 MB

You need: A 64-bit x86 Linux distribution (x86_64 / amd64). On a Raspberry Pi or any other ARM machine, take the Raspberry Pi build instead.

How to run each of them

The AppImage needs only to be made executable:

chmod +x BASIC256-*.AppImage
./BASIC256-*.AppImage

The tar.gz unpacks into a directory you can run from where it stands:

tar -xzf BASIC256-*.tar.gz
cd BASIC256-*/
./basic256

Neither writes anything outside the folder you put it in, and neither needs root.

Why the download is so large

Both formats bundle every prerequisite — Qt 6 and everything under it — so that they run on any distribution without you installing anything first. That self-containment is the whole point of an AppImage, and it is also why the download is so much larger than BASIC-256 itself.

A .deb package, we hope

A Debian package would list Qt and the other prerequisites as dependencies instead of carrying copies of them, which would cut the download to a small fraction of what it is now, and let apt handle updates and removal.

It does not exist yet. Packaging is on the project roadmap and we hope to offer a .deb alongside these builds in a future release; until then the AppImage and the tarball are the two supported ways to run BASIC-256 here.

Somewhere else to run it?

BASIC-256 runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, the Raspberry Pi and in a browser tab — the same language on all of them.