# Appendix I
Characters Recognized by GW-BASIC

The GW-BASIC character set includes all characters that are legal in GW-BASIC commands, statements, functions, and variables. The set comprises alphabetic, numeric, and special characters.

The alphabetic characters in GW-BASIC are the uppercase and lowercase letters of the alphabet.

The numeric characters in GW-BASIC are the digits 0 through 9.

The following special characters and terminal keys are recognized by GW-BASIC:

Character | Description
| Blank.
= | Equal sign or assignment symbol.
+ | Plus sign or string concatenation.
- | Minus sign.
* | Asterisk or multiplication symbol.
/ | Slash or division symbol.
^ | Caret, exponentiation symbol, or CTRL key.
( | Left parenthesis.
) | Right parenthesis.
% | Percent or integer declaration.
# | Number sign or double-precision declaration.
$ | Dollar sign or string declaration.
! | Exclamation point or single-precision declaration.
[ | Left bracket.
] | Right bracket.
, | Comma.
"" | Double quotation marks or string delimiter.
. | Period, dot, or decimal point.
' | Single quotation mark, apostrophe, or remark indicator.
; | Semicolon or carriage return suppressor.
: | Colon or line statement delimiter.
& | Ampersand or descriptor for hexadecimal and octal number conversion.
? | Question mark.
< | Less than symbol.
> | Greater than symbol.
\ | Backslash or integer division symbol.
@ | "At" sign.
_ | Underscore.
BACKSPACE | Deletes last character typed.
ESC | Erases the current logical line from the screen.
TAB | Moves print position to next tab stop. Tab stops are every eight columns.
CURSOR | Moves cursor to next physical line.
RETURN | Terminates input to a line and moves cursor to beginning of the next line, or executes statement in direct mode.