Which Assembler?

[emufan]

you are right. the manual says the same, asx need 2.0+
i've added the manual (postscript) to the zone.
with those virtual pdf printers, you can make a pdf from it.

[Leffmann]

I use vasm. If I was programming directly on the Amiga I would also look at Barfly for AmigaOS 2.0 with 68020. It's a very professional package with an assembler and a graphical debugger, probably the best you can find for Amiga.

Here's a speed-test for various assemblers I made, it shows the time needed to assemble 1Mb of code without optimizations, on a 50MHz 68030:

basm (Barfly)                   8 secs
ProAsm                         11 secs
phxass                         13 secs
ASM-One/ASM-Pro/Trash'm'one   136 secs
vasm                          263 secs
Genam (Devpac)                346 secs

It makes no sense to put that much code into a single unit, and the speed of an assembler matters little when you use proper build tools and good structure, but it's interesting to see how they perform.

In defense of vasm and Genam, they are both written in C and probably built with low optimization settings.

[Thorham]

Thanks for that, now I know not to waste my time with Devpac. 26 times as slow as PhxAss Really. 26 times? Madness

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Thanks for that, now I know not to waste my time with Devpac. 26 times as slow as PhxAss Really. 26 times? Madness

Hardly madness at all. Look when Devpac was first developed and then compare to when PhxAss was developed.

In real terms i've never had any assembly woes of the nature in that list, otherwise I would have binned Devpac years ago.

[kamelito]

@Leffmann Just read the blog, nice read, it says that just the linker is written in C the rest is pure ASM. IIRC Jez San Argasm was the fastest. Kamelito

[copse]

Originally Posted by kamelito

@Leffmann Just read the blog, nice read, it says that just the linker is written in C the rest is pure ASM. IIRC Jez San Argasm was the fastest. Kamelito

Argasm was perhaps the flakiest, and the buggiest as well..

[Lekman]

Devpac3 is the only program I have purchased. I can not find the original now, but found Devpac3 with the manual online.

Is there anyone here who knows why save button in Settings / Assembler Control is gone in v3.18? Very annoying.

[marduk_kurios]

Are you sure it is? I haven't used 3.18 as 3.01 is the last version that works on 1.3. However, I know that there are quite some shortcut keys that are not mentioned in the menu (like Amiga-D for the Debugger)

[Steve]

Originally Posted by marduk_kurios

Are you sure it is? I haven't used 3.18 as 3.01 is the last version that works on 1.3. However, I know that there are quite some shortcut keys that are not mentioned in the menu (like Amiga-D for the Debugger)

Yes, I use that version and confirm it is missing. There is only Cancel and Use options. Very Odd.

[modrobert]

Devpac back in the day, now vasm because we are graced with active development, thanks phx.

[StingRay]

Originally Posted by marduk_kurios

I read quite a few times that "Seka sucks", often explained by a lot of code written with Seka that is apparently horrible. Then I read that Devpac is the ultimate assembler while others ask "how can you possibly use that horrible thing" (I think that came from an ASM-One user).

It was possibly me who said that about Devpac. Never liked any of its incarnations on Atari or Amiga even though the assembler itself (Genam) is quite good! I always preferred Asm-One or its clones which I am still using nowadays. Back in the day it was (Master)Seka, then Asm-One, then Trash'm-One (great "pimped" Asm-One, at least the 1.xx versions, 2.0 wasn't really good) and nowadays AsmPro (mostly) and sometimes Asm1 (when I have to work around some AsmPro bugs).

[Josh]

Originally Posted by emufan

i've added the manual (postscript) to the zone.
with those virtual pdf printers, you can make a pdf from it.

Done... I have convert it to PDF an put it in the zone for all who interest in.

Thx for the manual emufan.


Cheers Josh

[marduk_kurios]

Originally Posted by StingRay

It was possibly me who said that about Devpac. Never liked any of its incarnations on Atari or Amiga even though the assembler itself (Genam) is quite good! I always preferred Asm-One or its clones which I am still using nowadays. Back in the day it was (Master)Seka, then Asm-One, then Trash'm-One (great "pimped" Asm-One, at least the 1.xx versions, 2.0 wasn't really good) and nowadays AsmPro (mostly) and sometimes Asm1 (when I have to work around some AsmPro bugs).

Hah, don't know whether it was you; I read too much about Amiga assemblers recently to remember. However, I myself prefer Trash'm-ONE as well, because it's loaded quickly, has its own screen and supports multiple files. Devpac feels kinda sluggish to me but that's probably because devpac is just overkill for the very small programs i am currently working on.

Regarding Trash'm: I have version 1.6 and 1.7. But 1.7 does not seem to run stable, at least it always crashes after quitting. Any idea about that?

[Alexco]

I once got a pile of software boxes and this included a "CodeX" Development package by Stefan Riege, which claimed to be compatible to Seka and DevPac. The one I have is from 1990 and has a price tag of 99DM.
Anyone knows this? I never tried that.

[marduk_kurios]

Never heard but it recently sold on ebay for 15 Euros

http://www.ebay.de/itm/CodeX-Assembl...p2047675.l2557

[emufan]

Originally Posted by Josh

Done... I have convert it to PDF an put it in the zone for all who interest in.

Thx for the manual emufan.

np. and thanks too

another assembler not mentioned here (!?) :
CAPE 68k 2.50 ( found by clenched )
Argonaut Software - Argasm 1.07 ( uploaded by mark_k )
both are in the zone

[StingRay]

Originally Posted by marduk_kurios

However, I myself prefer Trash'm-ONE as well, because it's loaded quickly, has its own screen and supports multiple files. Devpac feels kinda sluggish to me but that's probably because devpac is just overkill for the very small programs i am currently working on.

I find Devpac quite sluggish as well, I can work much faster with any of the various Asm-One versions despite the many bugs they all have.

Originally Posted by marduk_kurios

Regarding Trash'm: I have version 1.6 and 1.7. But 1.7 does not seem to run stable, at least it always crashes after quitting. Any idea about that?

I seem to remember that problem but it has been almost 2 decades that I last used Trash'm-One. If memory serves me right this was caused because v1.7 needed a lot more stackpace than the previous versions and the default stack size was too small, try to increase the stack before starting v1.7 and see if that helps.

[marduk_kurios]

Thanks! Both seem to work nicely on first test. My collection becomes somewhat comprehensive

[marduk_kurios]

Originally Posted by StingRay

I find Devpac quite sluggish as well, I can work much faster with any of the various Asm-One versions despite the many bugs they all have.

I also really like the Maxon 1.2. It's not the beast like the 4.x version for 3.1 but probably one of the more powerful assemblers. I haven't benchmarked it yet, though.

The IDE is ASM-One similar but it has the better debugger.

I seem to remember that problem but it has been almost 2 decades that I last used Trash'm-One. If memory serves me right this was caused because v1.7 needed a lot more stackpace than the previous versions and the default stack size was too small, try to increase the stack before starting v1.7 and see if that helps.

Thanks for the Idea, but still crashes with 20k stacksize. Actually it doesn't seem to crash: Everything's frozen after quitting and the CPU seems to be very busy... forever...

[Apollo]

The Maxon assembler was sold under the name "Kick-Ass". I bought this critter in the early 90s.

Here is a ebay link showing the box.
http://www.ebay.fr/itm/Kick-ASS-Asse...-/320943607818