Tree @b3d2d0b (Download .tar.gz)
SixtyPical
SixtyPical is a very low-level programming language, similar to 6502 assembly, with static analysis through abstract interpretation.
In practice, this means it catches things like
- you forgot to clear carry before adding something to the accumulator
- a subroutine that you call trashes a register you thought was preserved
- you tried to write the address of something that was not a routine, to a jump vector
and suchlike. It also provides some convenient operations and abstractions based on common machine-language programming idioms, such as
- copying values from one register to another (via a third register when there are no underlying instructions that directly support it)
- explicit tail calls
- indirect subroutine calls
The reference implementation can execute, analyze, and compile SixtyPical programs to 6502 machine code.
SixtyPical is a work in progress. The current released version of SixtyPical is 0.9-PRE (not released yet.)
Documentation
- Design Goals
- SixtyPical specification
- SixtyPical revision history
- Literate test suite for SixtyPical syntax
- Literate test suite for SixtyPical execution
- Literate test suite for SixtyPical analysis
- Literate test suite for SixtyPical compilation
- 6502 Opcodes used/not used in SixtyPical
TODO
Demo game
Finish the little demo "game" where you can move a block around the screen with the joystick (i.e. bring it up to par with the original demo game that was written for SixtyPical)
Self-reference in signatures
A vector might store [the address of] a routine which changes the vector. Thus its
signature might look like vector foo outputs foo
. Thus we need to support that.
vector table
type
low
and high
address operators
To turn word
type into byte
.
Save registers on stack
This preserves them, so that, semantically, they can be used later even though they are trashed inside the block.
Range checking in the abstract interpretation
If you copy the address of a buffer (say it is size N) to a pointer, it is valid. If you add a value from 0 to N-1 to the pointer, it is still valid. But if you add a value ≥ N to it, it becomes invalid. This should be tracked in the abstract interpretation. (If only because abstract interpretation is the major point of this project!)
And at some point...
- Compare word (constant or memory location) with memory location or pointer. (Maybe?)
copy x, [ptr] + y
- Maybe even
copy [ptra] + y, [ptrb] + y
, which can be compiled to indirect LDA then indirect STA! - Check that the buffer being read or written to through pointer, appears in approporiate inputs or outputs set.
byte table
andword table
of sizes other than 256- initialized
byte table
memory locations - always analyze before executing or compiling, unless told not to
trash
instruction.interrupt
routines -- to indicate that "the supervisor" has stored values on the stack, so we can trash them.- pre-initialized
word
variables - error messages that include the line number of the source code
- have
copy
instruction able to copy a byte to a user-def mem loc, etc. - add absolute addressing in shl/shr, absolute-indexed for add, sub, etc.
- check and disallow recursion.
- automatic tail-call optimization (could be tricky, w/constraints?)
- re-order routines and optimize tail-calls to fallthroughs
Commit History
@b3d2d0bfcfb1fcff0326436aedc6fe2456df3217
git clone https://git.catseye.tc/SixtyPical/
- Clearing up a little mystery I had here. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Improve error messaging yet more. Game kind of has game states now. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Improve error messaging when constraints are exceeded. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Constraint sets may only contain labels, which are resolved late. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Add failing test for a vector being able to name itself in outputs. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Add more notes and basically small cleanups in many places. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Slightly frustrating, but illuminating, attempt to title screen. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- "repeat forever" in the main loop, or at least as close as we can. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Some notes in the README. Chris Pressey 6 years ago
- Add a routine to clear the screen, in the demo game. Untested. Chris Pressey 6 years ago