A noob's guide to QL machine code

[NormanDunbar]

I have a somewhat irregular Assembly Language eMagazine over at:

https://github.com/NormanDunbar/QLAssem ... e/releases

where there are 11 or 12 issues ready to download for free.

The later issues include a Beginners' Corner where there are always details of how to assemble the code with QMAC and GWASS.

If executing GWASL gives you errors, I suspect you might have uncompressed it on a PC rather than in QDOS/SMSQ?


HTH

Cheers,
Norm.

[Derek_Stewart]

Hi

Reading the QMAC assembler manual, section B 5.3 page 40, allows the use of ADD<length> <ea> <ea>

If <length> omitted .w assumed

How does rmac handle QDOS executable headers?

Note: rmac being an Atari assembler.

[spkr]

Just assemble to binary and load the binary. The assembler has no need to care about headers per se.

[Derek_Stewart]

Just assemble to binary and load the binary. The assembler has no need to care about headers per se.

what filetype does the assembler produce?

[spkr]

Binary m68k.

[pjw]

@TMD2003, if you want to learn about assembler coding for QL systems from someone who knows, stick with Norm's ezine.

[Derek_Stewart]

This topic also dicussed on the QL Discord channel.

It seems that adding an XTcc trailer at the end of the ctoss compliled program, and a QL emulator or QLTools will restore the executable header.

Is the XTcc trailer data the best way to restore executable header in QDOS/SMSQ/E?

[XorA]

As the last thing in your asm program.

Code: Select all

trailer:
    dc.b 'X','T','c','c', 0, 0, 0, 0

Or set an actual dataspace if you need it!

qlzip, qltools, mdvtool (I think), sQLux, Q-Emulator, QPC2 all support that to recreate the exe info inside QDOS.

[Peter]

Is the XTcc trailer data the best way to restore executable header in QDOS/SMSQ/E?

In my opinion, yes it is. Extra data at the end of an executable hurts much less than at the beginning.

[tofro]

Is the XTcc trailer data the best way to restore executable header in QDOS/SMSQ/E?

In my opinion, yes it is. Extra data at the end of an executable hurts much less than at the beginning.

Well, the best method is not to loose them headers at all in the first place. I think every halfway decent QL user should be aware that unzipping on everything else but a QDOSSMSQ system is a big no-no. In my opinion, any method to make them forget this awareness is somewhat counter-productive and not much more than a kludge.

But XTcc is at least a method to potentially fix such accidents.