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- Freeze Note brushes, so HTML export doesn't blow up when it tries
to access them.
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- For code/data percentage, count inline data as data.
- Tweak code/data percentage text.
- Document Merlin32 '{' bug.
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376 lines
18 KiB
HTML
376 lines
18 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
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<head>
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<meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type" />
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<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
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<link href="main.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
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<title>Code Generation & Assembly - 6502bench SourceGen</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<div id="content">
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<h1>6502bench SourceGen: Code Generation & Assembly</h1>
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<p><a href="index.html">Back to index</a></p>
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<p>SourceGen can generate an assembly source file that, when fed into
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the target assembler, will recreate the original data file exactly.
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Every assembler is different, so support must be added to SourceGen
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for each.</p>
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<p>The generation / assembly dialog can be opened with File > Assemble.</p>
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<p>If you want to show code to others, perhaps by adding a page to
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your web site, you can "export" the formatted code as text or HTML.
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This is explained in more detail <a href="#export-source">below</a>.
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<h2><a name="supported">Supported Assemblers</a></h2>
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<p>SourceGen currently supports the following cross-assemblers:</p>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#64tass">64tass</a></li>
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<li><a href="#acme">ACME</a></li>
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<li><a href="#cc65">cc65</a></li>
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<li><a href="#merlin32">Merlin 32</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h3><a name="version">Version-Specific Code Generation</a></h3>
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<p>Code generation must be tailored to the specific version of the
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assembler. This is most easily understood with an example.</p>
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<p>If the code has a statement like <code>MVN #$01,#$02</code>, the
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assembler is expected to output <code>54 02 01</code>, with the arguments
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reversed. cc65 v2.17 got it backward; the behavior was fixed in v2.18. The
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bug means we can't generate the same <code>MVN</code>/<code>MVP</code>
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instructions for both versions of the assembler.</p>
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<p>Having version-dependent source code is a bad idea. If we generated
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reversed operands (<code>MVN #$02,#$01</code>), we'd get the correct
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output with v2.17, but the wrong output for v2.18. Unambiguous code can
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be generated for all versions of the assembler by just outputting raw hex
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bytes, but that's ugly and annoying, so we don't want to be stuck doing
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that forever. We want to detect which version of the assembler is in
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use, and output actual <code>MVN</code>/<code>MVP</code> instructions
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when producing code for newer versions of the assembler.</p>
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<p>When you configure a cross-assembler, SourceGen runs the executable with
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version query args, and extracts the version information from the output
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stream. This is used by the generator to ensure that the output will compile.
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If no assembler is configured, SourceGen will produce code optimized
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for the latest version of the assembler.</p>
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<h2><a name="generate">Generating Source Code</a></h2>
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<p>Cross assemblers tend to generate additional files, either compiler
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intermediaries ("file.o") or metadata ("_FileInformation.txt"). Some
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generators may produce multiple source files, perhaps a link script or
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symbol definition header to go with the assembly source. To avoid
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spreading files across the filesystem, SourceGen does all of its work
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in the same directory where the project lives. Before you can generate
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code, you have to have assigned your project a directory. This is why
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you can't assemble a project until you've saved it for the first time.</p>
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<p>The Generate and Assemble dialog has a drop-down list near the top
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that lets you pick which assembler to target. The name of the assembler
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will be shown with the detected version number. If the assembler
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executable isn't configured, "[latest version]" will be shown instead
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of a version number.</p>
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<p>The Settings button will take you directly to the assembler configuration
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tab in the application settings dialog.</p>
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<p>Hit the Generate button to generate the source code into a file on disk.
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The file will use the project name, with the <code>.dis65</code> extension
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replaced by <code>_<assembler>.S</code>.</p>
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<p>The first 64KiB of each generated file will be shown in the preview
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window. If multiple files were generated, you can use the "preview file"
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drop-down to select between them. Line numbers are
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prepended to each line to make it easier to track down errors.</p>
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<h3><a name="localizer">Label Localizer</a></h3>
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<p>The label localizer is an optional feature that automatically converts
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some labels to an assembler-specific less-than-global label format. Local
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labels may be reusable (e.g. using "]LOOP" for multiple consecutive
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loops is easier to understand than giving each one a unique label) or
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reduce the size of a generated link table. There are usually restrictions
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on local labels, e.g. references to them may not be allowed to cross a
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global label definition, which the localizer factors in automatically.</p>
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<p>The localizer is somewhat experimental at this time, and can be
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disabled from the
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<a href="settings.html#app-settings">application settings</a>.</p>
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<h3><a name="reserved-labels">Reserved Label Names</a></h3>
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<p>Some label names aren't allowed. For example, 64tass reserves the
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use of labels that begin with two underscores. Most assemblers will
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also prevent you from using opcode mnemonics as labels (which means
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you can't assemble <code>jmp jmp jmp</code>).</p>
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<p>If a label doesn't appear to be legal, the generated code will have
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a suitable replacement (e.g. <code>jmp_1 jmp jmp_1</code>).</p>
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<h2><a name="assemble">Cross-Assembling Generated Code</a></h2>
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<p>After generating sources, if you have a cross-assembler executable
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configured, you can run it by clicking the "Run Assembler" button. The
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command-line output will be displayed, with stdout and stderr separated.
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(I'd prefer them to be interleaved, but that's not what the system
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provides.)</p>
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<p>The output will show the assembler's exit code, which will be zero
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on success (note: sometimes they lie.) If it appeared to succeed,
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SourceGen will then compare the assembler's output to the original file,
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and report any differences.</p>
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<p>Failures here may be due to bugs in the cross-assembler or in
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SourceGen. However, SourceGen can generally work around assembler bugs,
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so any failure is an opportunity for improvement.</p>
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<h2><a name="quirks">Assembler-Specific Bugs & Quirks</a></h2>
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<p>This is a list of bugs and quirky behavior in cross-assemblers that
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SourceGen works around when generating code.</p>
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<p>Every assembler seems to have a different way of dealing with expressions.
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Most of them will let you group expressions with parenthesis, but that
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doesn't always help. For example, <code>PEA label >> 8 + 1</code> is
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perfectly valid, but writing <code>PEA (label >> 8) + 1</code> will cause
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most assemblers to assume you're trying to use an alternate (and non-existent)
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form of <code>PEA</code> with indirect addressing, causing the assembler
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to halt with an error message. The code generator needs
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to understand expression syntax and operator precedence to generate correct
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code, but also needs to know how to handle the corner cases.</p>
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<h3><a name="64tass">64tass</a></h3>
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<p>Code is generated for 64tass v1.53.1515 or later.
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<a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/tass64/">[web site]</a></p>
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<p>Bugs:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Undocumented opcode <code>SHA (ZP),Y</code> ($93) is not supported;
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the assembler appears to be expecting <code>SHA ABS,X</code> instead.</li>
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<li>WDM is not supported.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Quirks:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>The underscore character ('_') is allowed as a character in labels,
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but when used as the first character in a label it indicates the
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label is local. If you create labels with leading underscores that
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are not local, the labels must be altered to start with some other
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character, and made unique.</li>
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<li>Labels starting with two underscores are "reserved". Trying to
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use them causes an error.</li>
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<li>By default, 64tass sets the first two bytes of the output file to
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the load address. The <code>--nostart</code> flag is used to
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suppress this.</li>
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<li>By default, 64tass is case-insensitive, but SourceGen treats labels
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as case-sensitive. The <code>--case-sensitive</code> flag must be passed
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to the assembler.</li>
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<li>If you set the <code>--case-sensitive</code> flag, <b>all</b> opcodes
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and operands must be lower-case. Most of the SourceGen options that
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cause things to appear in upper case must be disabled.</li>
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<li>For 65816, selecting the bank byte is done with the grave accent
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character ('`') rather than the caret ('^'). (There's a note in the
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docs to the effect that they plan to move to carets.)</li>
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<li>The arguments to COP and BRK require immediate-mode syntax
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(<code>COP #$03</code> rather than <code>COP $03</code>).
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<li>For historical reasons, the default behavior of the assembler is to
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assume that the source file is PETSCII, and the desired encoding for
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strings is also PETSCII. No character conversion is done, so anybody
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assembling ASCII files will get ASCII strings (which works out pretty
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well if you're assembling code for a non-Commodore target). However,
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the documentation says you're required to pass the "--ascii" flag when
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the input is ASCII/UTF-8, so to build files that want ASCII operands
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an explicit character encoding definition must be provided.</li>
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</ul>
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<h3><a name="acme">ACME</a></h3>
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<p>Code is generated for ACME v0.96.4 or later.
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<a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/acme-crossass/">[web site]</a></p>
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<p>Bugs:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>The "pseudo PC" is only 16 bits, so any 65816 code targeted to run
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outside bank zero cannot be assembled. SourceGen currently deals with
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this by outputting the entire file as a hex dump.</li>
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<li>Undocumented opcode $AB (<code>LAX #imm</code>) generates an error.</li>
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<li>BRK and WDM are not allowed to have operands.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Quirks:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>The assembler shares some traits with one-pass assemblers. In
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particular, if you forward-reference a zero-page label, the reference
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generates a 16-bit absolute address instead of an 8-bit zero-page
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address. Unlike other one-pass assemblers, the width is "sticky",
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and backward references appearing later in the file also use absolute
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addressing even though the proper width is known at that point. This is
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worked around by using explicit "force zero page" annotations on
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all references to zero-page labels.</li>
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<li>Undocumented opcode <code>ALR</code> ($4b) uses mnemonic
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<code>ASR</code> instead.</li>
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<li>Does not allow the accumulator to be specified explicitly as an
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operand, e.g. you can't write <code>LSR A</code>.</li>
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<li>Syntax for <code>MVN</code>/<code>MVP</code> doesn't allow '#'
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before 8-bit operands.</li>
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<li>Officially, the preferred file extension for ACME source code is ".a",
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but this is already used on UNIX systems for static libraries (which
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means shell filename completion tends to ignore them). Since ".S" is
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pretty universally recognized as assembly source, code generated by
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SourceGen for ACME also uses ".S".</li>
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</ul>
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<h3><a name="cc65">cc65</a></h3>
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<p>Code is generated for cc65 v2.17 or v2.18.
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<a href="https://cc65.github.io/">[web site]</a></p>
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<p>Bugs:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>PC relative branches don't wrap around at bank boundaries.</li>
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<li>BRK can only be given an argument in 65816 mode.</li>
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<li>[Fixed in v2.18] The arguments to <code>MVN</code>/<code>MVP</code> are reversed.</li>
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<li>[Fixed in v2.18] <code>BRK <arg></code> is assembled to opcode
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$05 rather than $00.</li>
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<li>[Fixed in v2.18] <code>WDM</code> is not supported.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Quirks:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Operator precedence is unusual. Consider <code>label >> 8 - 16</code>.
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cc65 puts shift higher than subtraction, whereas languages like C
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and assemblers like 64tass do it the other way around. So cc65
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regards the expression as <code>(label >> 8) - 16</code>, while the
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more common interpretation would be <code>label >> (8 - 16)</code>.
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(This is actually somewhat convenient, since none of the expressions
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SourceGen currently generates require parenthesis.)</li>
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<li>Undocumented opcode <code>SBX</code> ($cb) uses the mnemonic AXS. All
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other opcodes match up with the "unintended opcodes" document.</li>
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<li>ca65 is implemented as a single-pass assembler, so label widths
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can't always be known in time. For example, if you use some zero-page
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labels, but they're defined via <code>.ORG $0000</code> after the point
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where the labels are used, the assembler will already have generated them
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as absolute values. Width disambiguation must be applied to operands
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that wouldn't be ambiguous to a multi-pass assembler.</li>
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<li>Assignment of constants and variables (<code>=</code> and
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<code>.set</code>) ends local label scope, so the label localizer
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has to take variable assignment into account.</li>
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<li>The assembler is geared toward generating relocatable code with
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multiple segments (it is, after all, an assembler for a C compiler).
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A linker configuration script is expected to be provided for anything
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complex. SourceGen generates a custom config file for each project.</li>
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</ul>
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<h3><a name="merlin32">Merlin 32</a></h3>
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<p>Code is generated for Merlin 32 v1.0.
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<a href="https://www.brutaldeluxe.fr/products/crossdevtools/merlin/">[web site]</a>
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<a href="https://github.com/apple2accumulator/merlin32/issues">[bug tracker]</a>
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</p>
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<p>Bugs:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>PC relative branches don't wrap around at bank boundaries.</li>
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<li>For some failures, an exit code of zero is returned.</li>
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<li>Immediate operands with a comma (e.g. <code>LDA #','</code>)
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or curly braces (e.g. <code>LDA #'{'</code>) cause an error.</li>
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<li>Some DP indexed store instructions cause errors if the label isn't
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unambiguously DP (e.g. <code>STX $00,X</code> vs.
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<code>STX $0000,X</code>). This isn't a problem with project/platform
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symbols, which are output as two-digit hex values when possible, but
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causes failures when direct page locations are included in the project
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and given labels.</li>
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<li>The check for 64KiB overflow appears to happen before instructions
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that might be absolute or direct page are resolved and reduced in size.
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This makes it unlikely that a full 64KiB bank of code can be
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assembled.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Quirks:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Operator precedence is unusual. Expressions are generally processed
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from left to right. The byte-selection operators have a lower
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precedence than all of the others, and so are always processed last.</li>
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<li>The byte selection operators ('<', '>', '^') are actually
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word-selection operators, yielding 16-bit values when wide registers
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are enabled on the 65816.</li>
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<li>Values loaded into registers are implicitly mod 256 or 65536. There
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is no need to explicitly mask an expression.</li>
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<li>The assembler tracks register widths when it sees SEP/REP instructions,
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but doesn't attempt to track the emulation flag. So if you issue a
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<code>REP #$20</code>
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while in emulation mode, the assembler will incorrectly assume long
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registers. Ideally it would be possible to configure that off, but
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there's no way to do that, so instead we occasionally generate
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additional width directives.</li>
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<li>Non-unique local labels should cause an error, but don't.</li>
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<li>No undocumented opcodes are supported.</li>
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</ul>
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<h2><a name="export-source">Exporting Source Code</a></h2>
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<p>The "export" function takes what you see in the code list in the app
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and converts it to text or HTML. The options you've set in the app
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settings, such as capitalization, text delimiters, pseudo-opcode names,
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operand expression style, and display of cycle counts are all taken into
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account. The file generated is not expected to work with an actual
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assembler.</p>
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<p>The text output is similar to what you'd get by copying lines to the
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clipboard and pasting them into a text file, except that you have greater
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control over which columns are included. The HTML version is augmented
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with links and (optionally) images.</p>
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<p>Use File > Export to open the export dialog. You have several
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options:</p>
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<ul>
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<li><b>Include only selected lines</b>. This allows you to choose between
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exporting all or part of a file. If no lines are selected, the entire
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file will exported. This setting does <b>not</b> affect link generation
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for HTML output, so you may have some dead internal links if you don't
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export the entire file.</li>
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<li><b>Include notes</b>. Notes are normally excluded from generated
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sources. Check this to include them.</li>
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<li><b>Show <Column></b>. The leftmost five columns are optional,
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and will not appear in the output unless the appropriate option is
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checked.</li>
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<li><b>Column widths</b>. These determine the minimum widths of the
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rightmost four columns. These are not hard limits: if the contents
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of the column are too wide, the next column will start farther over.
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The widths are not used at all for CSV output.</li>
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<li><b>Text vs. CSV</b>. For text generation, you can choose between
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plain text and Comma-Separated Value format. The latter is useful
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for importing source code into another application, such as a
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spreadsheet.</li>
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<li><b>Generate image files</b>. When exporting to HTML, selecting this
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will cause GIF images to be generated for visualizations.</li>
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<li><b>Overwrite CSS file</b>. Some aspects of the HTML output's format
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are defined by a file called "SGStyle.css", which may be shared between
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multiple HTML files and customized. The file is copied out
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of the RuntimeData directory without modification. It will be
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created if it doesn't exist, but will not be overwritten unless this
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box is checked. The setting is <b>not</b> sticky, and will revert
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to unchecked. (Think of this as a proactive alternative to "are you
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sure you wish to overwrite SGStyle.css?")</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Once you've picked your options, click either "Generate HTML" or
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"Generate Text", then select an output file name from the standard file
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dialog. Any additional files generated, such as graphics for HTML pages,
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will be written to the same directory.</p>
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<p>All output uses UTF-8 encoding. Filenames of HTML files will have '#'
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replaced with '_' to make linking easier.</p>
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</div>
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<div id="footer">
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<p><a href="index.html">Back to index</a></p>
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