asspull3x

[asspull3x]

[asspull3x]

[asspull3x]

Except for the little detail of using a 680x0 processor and the only PC compatibility being the built-in FAT support.

But you know...

How is the A3X different from the Amstrad Mega PC or Sega Teradrive?

Easy. It's really more like an IBM PCJr.

The Mega PC and Teradrive were two pretty much separate systems in a single case (an IBM PC and a Megadrive), with a switch on the front to decide which of the two is on screen.

The PCJr was a single system that happened to have both a diskette drive and a cartridge slot.

The A3X also is a single system with both a diskette drive and a cartridge slot. It just also has a console-like tile graphics mode. And any program code running on the A3X, be it from cartridge or disk, can use it.

[asspull3x]

How is the A3X different from the Amstrad Mega PC or Sega Teradrive?

Easy. It's really more like an IBM PCJr.

The Mega PC and Teradrive were two pretty much separate systems in a single case (an IBM PC and a Megadrive), with a switch on the front to decide which of the two is on screen.

The PCJr was a single system that happened to have both a diskette drive and a cartridge slot.

The A3X also is a single system with both a diskette drive and a cartridge slot. It just also has a console-like tile graphics mode. And any program code running on the A3X, be it from cartridge or disk, can use it.

[asspull3x]

[asspull3x]

I have an idea for a new feature.

Since there's enough VRAM to hold a whole 640×480 8bpp bitmap at once, that means anything smaller than that (say, 320×240?) has room to spare. The bitmap screen also overlaps with the text mode screen and tilemaps -- offset 0 is the top-left character, pixel, and tile.

So what if I added a page bit?

Consider games like the original pre-AGI PCJr version of King's Quest 1. Like on the Apple II, that's a graphical top part with a text-only bottom part:

On the A3X, you might do a mid-screen mode switch but then there would be garbage noise near the top of the graphics, because that's where the text goes.

But if you have pages, you can hit a particular line and switch not only modes but also pages, so the graphics and text don't have to overlap in memory.

This of course wouldn't work for the 640×480 8bpp bitmap mode, because that covers the entire range, but still!

And it doesn't have to be just the bottom 32 pixels (four lines) either. You could switch at any time, including to and from tile map modes.

Just an idea I had last night that Lancette then interrupted to ask how there's no music tracker or graphing calculator on the A3X yet.

Thoughts, anyone?

[asspull3x]

Lancette: But seriously the Asspull IIIx needs music tracker software and a scientific/programming/graphing calculator. These are good launch package programs Kawa: I find this suggestion unfeasible for me. Lancette: Really? You built the infrastructure it runs on but a calculator is beyond you? Kawa: Especially a scientific/graphing one. But the music tracker is even more unfeasible.

Lancette: You're telling me that you manifested a whole operating system out of thin air, complete with graphics formats, custom cartridge drives, and games, but a calculator is too far. Kawa: YES 😄 Lancette: How. Kawa: Believe it or not, these are completely different areas.

Lancette: You built your own picture viewer. For your own OS graphical management. And yet one of these escapes you. Unbelievable.

Kawa: I wouldn't know where to even begin with one of those.

... I mean, she's not wrong. That would be nice launch software to have. Even though I'd consider the A3X primarily a games system first. I mean, there's a reason it has no GUI.

[asspull3x]

That whole thing of course has nothing to do with the A3X and is just me rambling about how the underlying framework used in Zork (or rather Mini-Zork) works.

But this is in fact an A3X screenshot. Because the A3X can run Frotz.

I should work on some graphics support a bit, maybe. Technically this is a graphical mode after all, hence the proportional font.

Kinda funky how "open it, read it" works. First, the automatic listing of things in the room description sets "it" to the mailbox. I enter two commands on one line. The first is parsed as "open mailbox", and the default "open container" handler sets "it" to the leaflet. Then the second command is parsed as "read leaflet", which causes an implicit take.

It makes sense when you think about it, but "open it, read it" on its own... not as much I think.

[asspull3x]

Kinda funky how "open it, read it" works. First, the automatic listing of things in the room description sets "it" to the mailbox. I enter two commands on one line. The first is parsed as "open mailbox", and the default "open container" handler sets "it" to the leaflet. Then the second command is parsed as "read leaflet", which causes an implicit take.

It makes sense when you think about it, but "open it, read it" on its own... not as much I think.

[asspull3x]

... In my defense, I was freaking out at the time.

Just found out floating point is fucking broken. I haven't the tools, knowledge, or means to even begin finding out why, let alone fix it...

[asspull3x]

Found an interesting filter application. Does stills and videos. So here's a quick thing.

[asspull3x]

I'm open to suggestions and have the free time to try 'em.

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…

[asspull3x]

I hate that this works.

There's probably some implementation detail differences between the other two mul/divs and the two I added here, but it does end up successfully writing "3.14" to the screen. As in the "multiply by 100" works.

("fsglmul and fsgldiv truncate data to single precision before computing results." says one source I found just before adding those two case lines.)

And I hate it.

Near as I can tell from what invertego showed me about GCC, there might be a bug in GCC, and it should emit FSMUL but they got a ?: the wrong way around.

See? But on the flipside, Musashi (especially after the update where I had to jiggle the handle to get floats to compile) ostensibly supports 68040 so it should have FSGLMUL support.

It doesn't make sense and in the end I only needed two extra lines but it seems to work and I fucking hate it.

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…

[asspull3x]

What I'm getting from this is that GCC's take on "multiply a float by 100.0f" emits instructions that Musashi doesn't accept. It seems to have FSMUL.S and FMUL, but no FSGLMUL.S?

After all, if I leave the "* 100" out, it runs to completion but gives the wrong answer.

So either GCC is doing something wrong, or Musashi needs updating.

And there's no updates for Musashi.

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…

[asspull3x]

fpgen_rm_reg: unimplemented opmode 27 at 000200B8

It tried and failed to display this message. That's why it quit.

... I got nothing.

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…

[asspull3x]

Okay, it compiles. But now the damn thing just straight up quits the emulator when the first FPU instruction hits.

The work doesn't end.

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…

[asspull3x]

Oh yeah, this is not good.

Musashi (the off-the-shelf 68k core I use), as it was set up now, simply Does Not Support Floats.

And I can't figure out how to get it set up to do support floats, which is a thing it can support, without breaking compilation very badly…