68k Coding assistance

[SuperFuryAnimal]

I've decided that i want to learn assembly language, have bought some book and watched some youtube tutorials and i am starting to get my head around it (slowly). Problem if finding is a lot of information and a lot of what im reading/watching implies a basic knowledge of 68000 required.


So is there anyone who can code who is based in the South West UK who may be able to spend a couple hours with me getting the basics straight, answering a few questions and generally pointing in the right direction.


Message me if you think you can help, thanks

[Oriens]

Hi. Asking on this forum could also bring you lot of answers.
What is your goal ? what do you want to code in assembly ? (game, demo, tools, ....)

[SuperFuryAnimal]

Demos mostly, thought i'd start there and see where i go

[Oriens]

Great. Lot of demomakers here
Are you focused on a specific Amiga model ? (OCS, AGA, Accelerated ?)

[SuperFuryAnimal]

Not really, prob look towards AGA, have a A1200 im rebuilding so that will be my coding machine

[Oriens]

I'm not much into AGA, more into OCS.
Demo in AGA have different "flavour", that I'm not into. I prefer old effects.

As an advice, you can use a PC for coding (I do). There are some really great tool for compiling and then testing directly on winUAE. I'm using real hardware only for final testing .... but ... a 1200 with harddrive could be nice to code on. I was using one back in time.

Your quest will fo through learning the basics of 68K. Reading some book is nice. Just go through all instructions and try to understand them, as well as the processor registers.

Then find your coding platform. Either on PC (using vasm) or on 1200 (Asm-one). Then you can do some small program and exercices.

As a last step, you can check existing samples of demos. On Pouet website, quite lot of people are publishing their sourcecode. I'm mainly aware of A500 demos but sure there can be some for AGA as well. There are also some full "frameworks" shared by their authors (again I only know the A500 one, this one for example : https://github.com/AxisOxy/Planet-Rocklobster )

[mcgeezer]

I’m not based in the South West, but i am based in the North East.
I can probably do something 1-2-1 remotely with you over discord or Teams.
You’ll appreciate i don’t want to do it for nothing so pm me with an offer and perhaps we can come to an arrangement.

[Galahad/FLT]

Most important thing is to get your head around the syntax of how to use the 68000.

My advice would be to get WinUAE installed, get an Action Replay MK3 ROM image installed with it, the benefit is that you can assemble some code in memory in the Action Replay and use the monitor to view the results immediately so you can see how instructions work, like the difference between LEA and MOVE.L etc.

You can use Devpac or another assembler, but I find using Action Replay is quicker.

[SuperFuryAnimal]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Most important thing is to get your head around the syntax of how to use the 68000.

My advice would be to get WinUAE installed, get an Action Replay MK3 ROM image installed with it, the benefit is that you can assemble some code in memory in the Action Replay and use the monitor to view the results immediately so you can see how instructions work, like the difference between LEA and MOVE.L etc.

You can use Devpac or another assembler, but I find using Action Replay is quicker.

Thanks, some great advice, I shall set a system up like that over the weekend

[Radertified]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Most important thing is to get your head around the syntax of how to use the 68000.

My advice would be to get WinUAE installed, get an Action Replay MK3 ROM image installed with it, the benefit is that you can assemble some code in memory in the Action Replay and use the monitor to view the results immediately so you can see how instructions work, like the difference between LEA and MOVE.L etc.

You can use Devpac or another assembler, but I find using Action Replay is quicker.

This is the best advice so far.

I learned on an Amiga 500 with an Action Replay III. These days I use WinUAE's built-in debugger for the same stuff.
On C64, I learned with an Action Replay VI. On the PC, SoftICE and OllyDBG.

Load literally anything and break into your debugger. Step through some code and see what it does to memory and registers. You'll learn a lot by visually seeing it happen.

And as Galahad said, there's built-in assemblers so if you're curious how something works, you can assemble that instruction and see what's happening.

Don't forget the multitude of books available at https://commodore.bombjack.org/ or all of the assembly tutorials that have surfaced in the last few years (eg. Photon's series on YouTube).

[Keops/Equinox]

You can find really good 68000 info there: https://mrjester.hapisan.com/04_MC68/

ChibiAkumas also has interesting stuff and dedicated Amiga code: https://www.chibiakumas.com/68000/

[SuperFuryAnimal]

Thanks for all the help and advice people, much usefulness

Feels kinda like a fog clearing at the moment, getting the idea, its a new way of thinking

Managed to get a raster line in the middle of the screen yesterday and used a mouse click to return to the system and pretty much get how I did it.

Seems pretty amazing programming 68000, going to be a fun journey, think I need a notepad and some reference guides now though (registers etc)

[Jobbo]

If you're just getting started I wouldn't even do it on the Amiga itself or the emulator.

I would play around with EASy68k which is a Window editor/assembler/simulator http://www.easy68k.com/

It's a great framework for testing out code and has a simple simple to use debugger.