Multiplication & Division

Multiplication & Division
BYTEC’s hardware does not support integer multiplication and division. It was a design choice I made very early in the project in order to keep the hardware simple. Fortunately, both multiplication and division can be implemented in software using simple arithmetic (addition/subtraction and bit shifting). Until now I never got around to implementing it, but ...

Relocatable objects 2

Important software update today. I have updated my compiler toolchain to support relocatable objects. Even though today’s version does not bring many improvements in code generation, I consider it very important and getting me much closer to my goal of running “real software” on BYTEC/16. Until now, I only had a retargeted LCC compiler, which ...

Function pointers in C

Some time ago I ran a stress test of my compiler toolchain by compiling portions of Minix C library (compilation only, with no intention of running the code). This was to see if I encounter any problems. Overall I am happy with the results. I fixed several LCC machine description bugs, and I am now ...

Toolchain update 2

Last time I mentioned that LCC port required updates to the instruction set. Indeed, I decided to give up some instructions in favour of those which seemed to make more sense in view of code generation. I did a major ISA cleanup: I have removed register indirect with register offset addressing modes like in LD ...

ANSI C compiler for BYTEC/16

It’s been over six months since I last posted but I haven’t dropped out of the project completely. I have been slowly and quietly working on an initial revision of LCC port in short weekend sessions (not more than 2 hours each week). The reason for losing momentum a bit is my daughter Viktoria’s birth ...

Monitor/OS taking shape, EPROM emulator 5

Monitor/OS taking shape, EPROM emulator
I have just returned from a two and a half week training combined with short vacation. I haven’t posted for a while but the project is well alive and it will regain momentum now when I am back home. Immediate plans are to complete the Monitor/OS with a little help of a nice gadget described ...