3 ms·
> ZX Basic allows to inline assembly instructions!!! This is a killing feature This feature got 14yo me to devour the Z80 Programming guide by Rodnay Zaks [i].
by canada_dry 6y ago
> ZX Basic allows to inline assembly instructions!!! This is a killing feature
This feature got 14yo me to devour the Z80 Programming guide by Rodnay Zaks [i]. Which, introduced me to concepts like the address bus and registers that served me well through my 30+ year IT career.
[i] https://archive.org/details/Programming_the_Z-80_3rd_Edition_1980_Sybex/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/Programming_the_Z-80_3rd_Edition...
- beagle3 6y agoThe built in ZX Spectrum basic did not, though; What did you use? I remember using Picturesque assembler after giving up on hand-assembling instructions (though, I still remember a few random Z80 codes....)
- canada_dry 6y ago> The built in ZX Spectrum basic did not It's possible I'm mixing it up with the Sinclair ZX-81 (which I had before the Spectrum). At any rate, I ended up purchasing/installing a Z80 assembler EPROM (replacement for the original Sinclair ROM) which IIRC had a rudimentary debugger. I wonder if anyone else recalls such a thing?
- beagle3 6y agoLikely the ZX81 - external / replacement ROMs were more common for it (and for its predecessor, the ZX80) because there wasn’t enough ram for much software. The ZX spectrum had 16K and 48K models (with the latter being significantly more popular from day 1 and the only one available a while later). most software depended on specific addresses in the built in ROM, the 64K address space was fully utilized AND there was enough RAM so software in ROM wasn’t popular.