Re: Fluke compiler software

> Urk....I can help with finding the memory map for the fluke and
> helping figure out the hardware side, but I am NOT a code jockey.
>
> Neil's MZ80 emulator can be found at:
> ftp://ftp.synthcom.com/pub/emulators/cpu/makez80.zip
>
> So anyone want to help? Fame and riches abound! If not then perhaps a
> few evenings of headaches...one or the other. The 9010A roms are up on
> ftp.flippers.com/Fluke I have joined them into a contiguous block.

Why emulate the 9010A at all? The reason to emulate an actual device's
microprocessor and hardware is to utilize its software with 0 changes.
However, you are still stuck with the limitations of the original
device. So, while perhaps you could have a disk-load function for
reading programs into the emulated 9010A's ram (rather than a tape
device on the real hardware), you are still stuck with the same
functions, the same display concept, the same model. The 9010A's
software (or OS, if you will) is not so complex, powerful, or novel that
it even needs to be preserved.

Emulating a Z80 and the Fluke's entire hardware setup, only to get
almost exactly what you started with (although on a PC, with a disk
drive instead of tape) seems limiting and shortsighted, no? Perhaps
*I* am missing the point of the project!

I would propose that instead, you emulate the operation of the 9010A
only - which is what I thought John's idea was in the first place. You
write a completely new piece of software, that knows how to interact
with the pod, and, to reuse what 9010A scripts have been written (which
really aren't so complex they couldn't be re-written anyway..), perhaps
it could interpret the scripts, compiling them into its own internal
form, and doing similar operations to what the 9010A would have. That
scripting language could be greatly expanded, using real constructs, or
just expand another language that already exists and has a following
(perl, tcl, python, whatever...) Each of those could be extended to
have the same "commands" that Fluke-script defined (READ @ 0010)... but
it wouldn't be limited by that at all.
Received on Thu Apr 04 05:39:00 2002