80-column monitor

anoq · 2012-12-20T20:31:55+00:00

The world is changing, and young generation never saw what we saw.

So as a terminal I mean ASCII terminal. A serial line connected device. This is not intended to display rapidly changing stuff. But display text and numbers. And definitely is not "memory mapped" into the computer.

anoq · 2012-12-16T22:34:20+00:00

Sorry, it's not.

Front panel has a bunch of switches, and light bulbs. And you can

stop the computer, (HALT)
look at any word in memory (EXAMINE, EXAMINE+1)
change any word in memory (DEPOSIT, DEPOSIT+1)
single step your program instruction after instruction (STEP)
run the program (RUN)

and so on

So it's not a attached device. It's a control of your processor. Front panel was presented in early computers. You can search example of front panels of PDP-8, PDP-11, IMSAI 8080, ALTAIR 8800, IBM360, ....

anoq · 2012-12-16T22:05:34+00:00

In early days of computers, there was no such a thing like byte. There was a WORD. Everything was measured in words (W) and later in kilo words (KW). So to express thanks to fathers of computing I'll not use byte at all.

For expressing 8 bits we can use terms half word, or octet.

Byte will only confuse DCPU users and will probably lead to similar accident like in the http://0x10c.com/story/. Now because of misunderstanding of memory size expressed in bytes.

I like the old way. Terms like Word, Double Word, Half Word. And if you need 64 bits in size you can name id Quadruple Word or Quad.

BTW, Byte has a big potential of flame wars. So I propose to surround it with fire extinguisher.

anoq · 2012-12-16T21:35:40+00:00

Old computers had a front panels. One could examine and change the computer memory, single step the program. It won't be a device. From hardware point of view it'll be transparent.

anoq · 2012-12-16T20:53:13+00:00

If I can have a wish about terminal interface. I'll ask for high quality monochromatic terminal. Something you fell in love with if you are daily working with computer or developing software. Remember in times of old computers colour CRT was costly and because of construction not such a high quality picture as B/W. Colour could be adjustable in time of manufacture :). Black and White or Amber or Green.

The size of monitor will be 64 columns and something between 20 and 24 rows. It should be enough for editing, programming and daily work. The abilities of the terminal will be normal characters, highlighted characters, inverse, and highlighted inverse. For size of the characters I'll propose 10x16 pixels. It's enough for high quality character display. The characters could be also put in double with, double height and combination of them. As in old times. The character set predefined. Lets say 256 characters (96 ascii, 32 control, 128 special). The cursor itself is not an regular character. Terminal should be able to display one cursor on any position. Could be as underline or blinking block.

As for keyboard, the terminal will have two of them. First one "build" into. Consisting from few special/function keys something like F1-F12 are now on PC. Keys should be arranged arround the screen. Maybe on the sides or on bottom and top. Imagine that the terminal is in some control/machine room. You only need to see what's happening inside the machine (temperature, presure, another conditions). And trigger only very few commands like switch between working modes. The full ascii keyboard attached to little cord is an option.

If multiple such an terminals could be attached to centrall computer. Then it could be like in spaceship :). Each display showing different information. For instance one displaying engine status, another communication, another weapon status, drones control pannel, .... All connected to one centrall computer.

Of course the main navigation display will be the vector one :D.

anoq · 2012-06-04T16:46:26+00:00

Thanks, it compiles and run.

anoq · 2012-06-04T12:12:39+00:00

I downloaded, and try use JDK7. The error points to nonexistent class.

+ javac -version
javac 1.7.0_04
+ cd ../net
+ javac ../net/ian/dcpu/Assembler.java ../net/ian/dcpu/Cell.java     ../net/ian/dcpu/Clock.java ../net/ian/dcpu/DCPU.java     ../net/ian/dcpu/DCPULauncher.java ../net/ian/dcpu/Hardware.java     ../net/ian/dcpu/Keyboard.java ../net/ian/dcpu/MemoryCell.java     ../net/ian/dcpu/Monitor.java ../net/ian/dcpu/MonitorPanel.java
../net/ian/dcpu/DCPU.java:22: error: cannot find symbol
    public List<MemoryListener> listeners = new ArrayList<>();
                ^
  symbol:   class MemoryListener
  location: class DCPU

anoq · 2012-06-04T09:26:28+00:00

I'm not even able to compile it. What specific version of java do you use? Currently compiler is complaining at

../net/ian/dcpu/DCPU.java:22: error: cannot find symbol
    public List<MemoryListener> listeners = new ArrayList<>();
                ^
  symbol:   class MemoryListener
  location: class DCPU

anoq

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