Deja News Toolbar Search over 20,000 high-tech jobs Click here for over 20,000 high-tech jobs message/thread Message 176 of 25 for search * help Re: What's Diabolo? (and who's Po Ching?) Author: Cameron Kaiser Date: 1999/02/23 Forum: comp.sys.cbm sponsored by: eBay more headers author posting history post reply _________________________________________________________________ John/Lori writes: >I came across this: >http://www.dejanews.com/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?AN=224766115 >I gather Diabolo is a 16 bit integer basic compiler >Is there somewhere I can find out more? Po-Ching is me! Way back when I was a university student, I used the handle Po-Ching Lives! because that was my nickname. Don't ask how a white guy ended up with a Mandarin Chinese name. Diabolo is a 16-bit integer BASIC compiler, yes. Forcibly, even -- even eight bit quantities are handled in 16, which is an aggravating and crippling restriction. Despite this, it makes much faster code than BASIC 64 or other compilers because it goes straight to assembly, not P-Code or calls to the BASIC interpreter. For example, A=5 becomes lda #5 ldx #0 sta avar stx avar+1 and POKE 1024, A becomes (I think) lda #0 ldx #4 sta zp stx zp+1 lda avar ldy #0 sta (zp),y As you can see, it could use a lot of optimization, but it does surprisingly well, comparatively. Nether G1 was written in Diabolo, so believe me when I say that large projects are possible in it. Unfortunately, the optimization roblems are its biggest Achilles heel. I've got a mini version of Diabolo I wrote called Gallipoli that handles 8/16 bit quantities, but it supports very few keywords and the optimizer is rather, er, overzealous. :-) Diabolo is also not very friendly about connecting to external routines. Can you believe it does *not* support SYS, the easiest instruction to implement? A simple JSR would have done. It doesn't like parentheses, it's very squidgy about syntax, it doesn't handle too many keywords, and forget about strings. Yet, if you need a speedy object file and you can't abide assembler, it's the only way to fly. Ask if you have specific questions, since I've used it for several years. -- Cameron Kaiser * cdkaiser.cris@com * powered by eight bits * operating on faith -- supporting the Commodore 64/128: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/cwi/ -- head moderator comp.binaries.cbm * cbm special forces unit $ea31 (tincsf) personal page http://calvin.ptloma.edu/~spectre/ * "when in doubt, take a pawn" _________________________________________________________________ view for bookmarking text only mail this message to a friend post reply << prev · next >> subscribe to comp.sys.cbm SPONSORED LINKS Yellow Pages · Bid on Bargains · Shopping · Free Stuff · 5¢ long distance AutoConnect · Trade with Datek · Auctions & Classifieds · GET IT NOW @ NECX Home · Communities · My Deja News · Power Search · Post About Deja News · Ad Info · Our Advertisers ____________________________________________________ Copyright © 1995-99 Deja News, Inc. All rights reserved. Conditions of use · Site privacy statement reviewed by TRUSTe