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6502bench/docs/sgmanual/tools.html
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<title>Tools - 6502bench SourceGen</title>
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<h1>SourceGen: Tools</h1>
<p>The <samp>Tools</samp> menu offers a selection of useful tools that
operate independently of the current project (if any).</p>
<h2 id="instruction-chart">Instruction Chart</h2>
<p>This opens a window with a summary of all 256 opcodes. The CPU can
be chosen from the pop-up list at the bottom. Undocumented opcodes for
6502/65C02 are shown in italics, and can be excluded from the list
by unchecking the box at the bottom.</p>
<p>The status flags affected by each instruction reflect their behavior
on the 65816. The only significant difference between 65816 and
6502/65C02 is the way the <code>BRK</code> instruction affects the
D and B/X flags.</p>
<h2 id="ascii-chart">ASCII Chart</h2>
<p>This opens a window with the ASCII character set. Each character is
displayed next to its numeric value in decimal and hexadecimal. The
pop-up list at the bottom allows you to flip between standard and "high"
ASCII.</p>
<h2 id="apple2-screen-chart">Apple II Screen Chart</h2>
<p>The Apple II text and hi-res screens are mapped to memory in a way
that makes sense to computers but is a little confusing for humans. This
chart maps line numbers to addresses and vice-versa. Select different
screens and sort orders from the list at the bottom.</p>
<h2 id="hexdump">Hex Dump Viewer</h2>
<p>You can use this to view the contents of the project data file
by double-clicking the values in the "Bytes" column, or with
<samp>Actions &gt; Show Hex Dump</samp>.
The viewer is displayed in a "modeless" dialog that does not
prevent you from continuing to work with the project. If you
double-click a different line in the project, the viewer will automatically
highlight those bytes.</p>
<p>You can also view the contents of arbitrary files by using
<samp>Tools &gt; Hex Dump</samp>. There is no fixed limit on the number of
viewers you can have open simultaneously. (Be aware that the viewer
currently loads the entire file into memory, and you will run out of room
eventually. Not coincidentally, the viewer has a size limit of 16MiB
per file.)</p>
<p>You can select lines with the mouse as you would in any other list
view. <kbd class="key">Ctrl+A</kbd> selects all lines.
<kbd class="key">Ctrl+C</kbd> copies the selected lines to
the system clipboard.</p>
<p>The "character conversion" selector allows you to choose how the
bytes are converted to characters for the Text column. Choose from
the usual set of encodings.</p>
<p>If <samp>ASCII-only dump</samp> is not checked, non-printable bytes
are shown in the ASCII dump as a middle dot ('&#183;'). If the option is
checked, non-printable bytes are represented by a period ('.') instead.
The use of non-ASCII characters makes the dump unambiguous when unprintable
characters are mixed with periods, but the lines may be unsuitable for
pasting in some forums.</p>
<p>If <samp>always on top</samp> is checked, the window will stay above
all other windows that don't also declare that they should always be on
top. By default this box is checked when displaying project data, and
not checked for external files.</p>
<h2 id="file-concat">File Concatenator</h2>
<p>The File Concatenator combines multiple files into a single file.
Select the files to add, arrange them in the proper order, then hit
<samp>Save</samp>. CRC-32 values are shown for reference.</p>
<h2 id="file-slicer">File Slicer</h2>
<p>The File Slicer allows you to "slice" a piece out of a file, saving
it to a new file. Specify the start and length in decimal or hex. If
you leave a field blank, they will default to offset 0 and the remaining
length of the file, respectively.</p>
<p>The hex dumps show the area just before and after the chunk to be
sliced, allowing you to confirm the positions.</p>
<h2 id="omf-converter">OMF Converter</h2>
<p>This tool allows you to view Apple IIgs Object Module Format (OMF)
executables, and convert them for disassembly.</p>
<p>OMF executables have multiple segments with relocatable code. References
to addresses aren't filled in until the program is loaded into memory,
which makes it difficult to disassemble the file. The conversion tool
loads the OMF file in roughly the same way the GS/OS System Loader would,
placing each segment at the start of a bank unless otherwise directed.
The loaded image is saved to a new file, and a SourceGen project file is
created with some basic attributes filled in.</p>
<p>Only "Load" files (S16, PIF, TOL, etc) may be converted. Compiler object
files and libraries (OBJ, LIB) contain references that must be resolved by
a IIgs linker, and are not supported.</p>
<p>Before you can examine or convert a file, you must first extract
it from the Apple II disk image, using a mode that does not modify the
original (e.g. extract with "configure to preserve Apple II formats"
in CiderPress). Then, open it with <samp>Tools &gt; Convert OMF</samp>.</p>
<p>The initial view shows all of the OMF segments in the file. Double-clicking
on an entry opens a detailed view that shows the segment header and a
list of all the OMF records. For load files, the relocation dictionary is
also shown.</p>
<p>To convert the file, click <samp>Generate</samp> to create a
modified binary and a SourceGen project file.</p>
<p>If <samp>offset segment start by $0100</samp> is checked, the
converter will try to shift the segment's load address from
<code>$xx/0000</code> to <code>$xx/0100</code>. This can make the
generated code a little nicer to work with because it removes potential
ambiguity with direct page addresses. For example, <code>LDA $56</code>
and <code>LDA $0056</code> may be interpreted as the same thing by the
assembler, requiring generation of operand width disambiguators. By
shifting the initial address we avoid the potential ambiguity.</p>
<p>Check <samp>add comments and notes for each segment</samp> to add a
long comment and a note at the start of each segment. The comments
include the segment name, type, and optional flags. The notes just
provide a quick way to jump to a segment.</p>
<p>The binary generated by the tool is not in OMF format and will not
execute on an Apple IIgs. To be functional, the generated sources must be
assembled by a program capable of generating OMF output, such as Merlin.</p>
<p>The <a href="advanced.html#reloc-data">relocation dictionaries</a> from
the executable are included in the project file, and can be used to guide
the disassembler's analysis. The <samp>use reloc data</samp> setting in
the project properties controls this feature.</p>
<p>A full explanation of the structure of OMF is beyond the scope of this
manual. For more information on OMF, see Appendix F of the GS/OS Reference
Manual.</p>
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