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It is possible to build the emulators only. This requires Python & PIL, and SDL2, but only the build option for the platform in question. This can be started by "make linux" or "make windows" from the root.
The emulator has several options on the command line.
"cold" boots BASIC in standard mode, avoiding the monitor
"warm" boots BASIC in warmstart mode, anything in memory will be retained.
"exec" boots BASIC and runs the program in memory.
Program can be loaded into memory using the syntax @
. That address can be "page" which means the address BASIC expects to find the code in.So to load and run a program use the following :
../bin/neo build/basic.bin@800 build/tokenised.dat@page exec
Or in windows
..\bin\neo.exe build\basic.bin@800 build\tokenised.dat@page exec
This (1) starts the emulator (2) loads the BASIC interpreter to $800 (this is normally done by the monitor which is being skipped) (3) loads the tokenised BASIC program to "page" (currently at $3200 but changes over time) (4) sets it to run 'exec'
One can create an example BASIC program from a text equivalent (see the basic/code directory for many examples), this is done with the makebasic.zip program which requires Python 3
Something like
python3 makebasic.zip build/source.txt -obuild/tokenised.dat
this converts the file "source.txt" which is a basic source file in text form, line numbers optional to a tokenised program which can be run as above.
These examples work. Obviously you may want to change file names and directories.
Arch Linux. Sublime Text is the editor, ARM GCC v13.2, Python 3.11.6 with PIL/Pillow installed (does the graphics conversion stuff). 64tass does the 6502 assembly. CMake 3.28.1 Gnu Make 4.4.1 (though it doesn't do anything clever !). Documentation is mostly libreoffice. Hardware is a i5-4690 with 16Gb of RAM, most of the uploading uses a Pico based debugger from "The Pi Hut" which I think is a standard design. A Raspi Keyboard with USB hub, a SanDisk USB3.1 key and Olimex's SDCard device are permanently plugged in. You can't use both at once but they don't seem to upset each other.
*** IMPORTANT ***
If you are using the SD Card storage board made by Olimex, it requires the switches 2-4 on the B boards to be OFF. The board is shipped with all switches set to 'on' (Switch 1 is the on board beeper).
Without this change the SD Card will not work (see the board manual page 12).
Paul Robson. [email protected] 23rd January 2024
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