Search found 613 matches

by ketmar
Fri Mar 29, 2024 12:28 am
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

hm. i decompiled Forth part of White Lightning, and it looks quite interesting. the usual fig model code is intact (of course), along with several standard fig inefficiencies. but the added code looks way more interesting. for exampe: it contains two "AT" implementations, absolutely identi...
by ketmar
Thu Mar 28, 2024 8:24 pm
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

fun fact: for some reason White Lightning has around 40 hidden words. they are not linked to any vocabulary, but have valid headers and names (and they are referenced from other, visible words). it looks like that system wasn't cross-compiled from some asm source code, but created in several stages....
by ketmar
Thu Mar 28, 2024 3:48 pm
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

ported ROM floating point library from dsForth. for ~1KB of code you'll have full floating point support, backed by ROM calculator. because why not? ;-)

i know, i know, Chuck Moore said that floating point math is for wimps. but hey, i don't have to write my own FP code in asm anyway! ;-)
by ketmar
Thu Mar 28, 2024 12:28 am
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

It'll be cool to see the example game. it is the one supplied with Mastertronic re-release. that tape contains RAM-DISC image, you can load it with "LOADT", and then use "1 LOAD" to load the game. but beware: the game completely sux. ;-) So if i read the manual to fig forth I wo...
by ketmar
Wed Mar 27, 2024 4:49 pm
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

i had to look at (and edit) the sample game. standard line editor sux, so i wrote the fullscreen one. and implemented 64 columns print driver for it. ;-) https://files.catbox.moe/xxnhla.png the editor works in any mode, though (32, 42, 64). it has line yank/insert, and nice incremental search. by th...
by ketmar
Mon Mar 25, 2024 8:22 pm
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Re: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

i am preparing poc v2, btw, with many decompilation bugs fixed. i managed to cut demo game compiling time from ~40 seconds to ~20 seconds. the change is very simple: i put LFA field before NFA. i don't know why Bill Ragsdale decided to organize word headers this way, but the effect is that "(FI...
by ketmar
Mon Mar 25, 2024 9:00 am
Forum: Games/Software
Topic: Devfinitive Edition (Steve Crow): vote
Replies: 25
Views: 439

Re: Devfinitive Edition (Steve Crow): vote

it is so sad to see poor snake having no votes at all… i'll prolly change mine now.
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 10:37 pm
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

several Forth CPUs had various interesting… solutions, including minimalistic instruction sets, superscalar CPUs, VLIW CPUs… and most of them are even more minimalistic than minimalistic RISCs! ;-)
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 6:26 pm
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled
Replies: 7
Views: 248

Abersoft fig-Forth Recompiled

as i played with AberForth , i also created Yet Another decompiled version of it. there were other decompiled versions, but mine has something new to offer. ;-) * rebased to $6000, so it can be used with TR-DOS (no TR-DOS support included yet). * removed some unused FIG-Forth parts ("MON",...
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 1:47 pm
Forum: Games/Software
Topic: Devfinitive Edition (Steve Crow): vote
Replies: 25
Views: 439

Re: Devfinitive Edition (Steve Crow): vote

Starquake looks like a definitive winner here. heh, i once remembered the whole map, along with teleport keywords…
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 1:13 pm
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

I didn't think of calling "stc-to-dstack" and calling "stc-to-rstack" to switch SP contents. When I initially tried different variants of how to use SP, I was told that changing SP is not worth it. it doesn't worth it with the traditional STC code. but Succubus does very aggress...
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 7:28 am
Forum: Games/Software
Topic: Impossible games...
Replies: 24
Views: 879

Re: Impossible games...

Morkin wrote: Mon Mar 18, 2024 3:35 pm Two words:

Mutan Zone
hey, spanish games don't count, nobody can beat The Spanish Inquisition!

p.s.: i did Freddy Hadest 1 and Game Over 1 without cheats. but it was accidental.
by ketmar
Sun Mar 24, 2024 7:23 am
Forum: Preservation
Topic: Fake history
Replies: 16
Views: 713

Re: Fake history

i bet that the only game that may pass is a crap one. prolly even in BASIC. and there is no reason to do it, because it won't be a "hidden gem", people will barely notice. the thing is that it's not so hard to spot modern games disguised as old ones. graphical style, programming style, all...
by ketmar
Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:18 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

And I solved your code for days. this is because you had tried to decipher the output of highly optimising compiler. take GCC -O3 output, for example, and try to "decompile" it back to C code. it will be very hard to do, because the compiler transformed the original code into something ba...
by ketmar
Sat Mar 23, 2024 8:44 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

I've been trying for days (!!!) to understand that code. ah, it's mostly straightforward. i omited some helper routines, tho. You don't use do..loop loops, so I replaced them with the closest equivalent, namely begin..while..repeat and begin..until yeah, i am not a big fan of DO/FOR, and sometimes ...
by ketmar
Fri Mar 22, 2024 12:16 pm
Forum: Programming
Topic: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling
Replies: 33
Views: 775

Re: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling

by the way, it is possible to do this (copy the whole screen in one frame) on Pentagon. it has slightly more tstates per frame, and no wait states. but you have to load values directly into registers in blit routine, so drawing to such backbuffer is a PITA, and will kill the performance anyway. but ...
by ketmar
Fri Mar 22, 2024 8:38 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling
Replies: 33
Views: 775

Re: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling

eh. just take a look at Firefly. 8-direction scrolling (actually, there is no "scrolling" there, the engine can draw the map from the arbitrary coordinates). 25 FPS, JIT-compiled blitter, and many, many different maps, all in 48k. i once extracted that engine and turned it into reusable, w...
by ketmar
Thu Mar 21, 2024 5:47 pm
Forum: Programming
Topic: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling
Replies: 33
Views: 775

Re: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling

yep, i agree: drawing behind the raster is way easier. you'll have ~14K tstates to prepare: jit-compile your render code, sort sprites, play some music, and so on. and then you can render everything without worrying about raster at all. even if your render code will take more than 69K tstates, it do...
by ketmar
Thu Mar 21, 2024 11:02 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling
Replies: 33
Views: 775

Re: Machine Code: Moving from Attribute scrolling to pixel scrolling

btw. if you are scrolling by 8 pixels a time, and you see attribute flicker, then you need to rewrite your scoll routines. do not scroll attrs and gfx separately: copy one char, and then immediately copy its attribute. that's if i understood you right.
by ketmar
Mon Mar 18, 2024 4:36 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

anyway, isn't it is the time to rewrite the compiler in Forth? ;-) it will be much, much faster, and it will be possible to mix target code and host Forth code (i.e. use host Forth to calculate some tables, for example). you can use intermediate bytecode (as i did in my SSA compiler). i.e. compile e...
by ketmar
Mon Mar 18, 2024 4:23 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

as for "DOES>", the new standard did it wrong (yet again). in fig-FORTH there was a special word to create "doers": "<BUILDS … DOES>". i.e. "CREATE"d words cannot have "DOES>" part, only "builded". : a create … does> … ; — WRONG! : b <build...
by ketmar
Mon Mar 18, 2024 4:11 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: Forth compiler for ZX
Replies: 67
Views: 2195

Re: Forth compiler for ZX

What is SSA poc.? i meant my SSA-based proof-of-concept compiler. it is not ready to be published yet, but basically it works like this: 1. compiled code is represented by a special VM bytecode (primitives are encoded as one-byte VM instructions, calls to other high-level words are 2 bytes). this b...
by ketmar
Sun Mar 17, 2024 7:20 am
Forum: Showcase your work!
Topic: Abersoft fig-Forth v1.2 (with 42 cols driver)
Replies: 1
Views: 92

Abersoft fig-Forth v1.2 (with 42 cols driver)

this is the modification of Abersoft fig-Forth system made on request of PeterJ . it is using 42-columns print driver, and extended line editor. (and some bugfixes to the original system). it is fully compatible with the original system. download: v1.2 RC2 (includes mod source code). brief documenta...
by ketmar
Sat Mar 16, 2024 12:31 am
Forum: Programming
Topic: With Machine Code how much memory to leave basic
Replies: 7
Views: 299

Re: With Machine Code how much memory to leave basic

yeah, please, $6000! ;-) this will make TR-DOS-lovers life slightly easier: TR-DOS needs buffer for disk sector, and for some other data. sure, you don't have to think about crappy DOS nobody in their sane mind would use, but… why not? ;-)
by ketmar
Sat Mar 09, 2024 4:48 pm
Forum: Programming
Topic: Measuring frames/VSYNC
Replies: 10
Views: 535

Re: Measuring frames/VSYNC

or you can let the ray go. ;-) if you'll start drawing after the ray is passed, you'll have the whole frame to draw everything. some games are using this tech, finishing everything when the ray is already drawing the start of the frame (which was already updated). the only problem is to make sure th...