Recent Posts

1

Off topic / Re: Is anyone using apps on their phones for CPC development?

« Last post by mr_lou on Today at 11:53 »

Despite owning a relatively new smart phone with massive screen, phones just aren't suitable for anything that requires a lot of user input. Content consumption / reading / videos are all fine, but if the job involves anything that requires any user input beyond scribbling or choosing a few option buttons, then that job is just going to take longer and be more frustrating.

We definitely agree that it has to be suitable for phone use.
Pixelgraphics creation should be fairly simple, I think. Select a color, then draw by clicking each square in the grid.

In my case of course, the software I need to use just doesn't exist for mobile devices. And that's good, because if I had to create a schematic and route a PCB on a phone or tablet I would probably go mad.

If I do a search for "schematics" on Google Appstore, then there are a few results for circuit creation. I can't imagine you'd go mad from using such an app. All it really needs, is to be compatible with the tools you're already using on your PC. But selecting and placing components, and drawing lines to connect them? Seems to me that qualifies as "scribbling or choosing a few option buttons". But I of course don't know, as I haven't played with such apps since school.

2

Off topic / Re: Is anyone using apps on their phones for CPC development?

« Last post by Bryce on Today at 11:16 »

Despite owning a relatively new smart phone with massive screen, phones just aren't suitable for anything that requires a lot of user input. Content consumption / reading / videos are all fine, but if the job involves anything that requires any user input beyond scribbling or choosing a few option buttons, then that job is just going to take longer and be more frustrating.In my case of course, the software I need to use just doesn't exist for mobile devices. And that's good, because if I had to create a schematic and route a PCB on a phone or tablet I would probably go mad.

Bryce.

3

Off topic / Re: Is anyone using apps on their phones for CPC development?

« Last post by mr_lou on Today at 10:29 »

Well actually, no. Many people don't have desktops anymore to work, and are content with iPads and the like (or "decks" on which mobiles can be attached, with remote keyboard, mouse and screen).

Ah, like that. Yea, I don't understand that either.

But I actually bought a tablet with a Smart Pen to write down ideas, draw schemas and stuff. Very nice.

Sounds nice indeed!

I carry with me my Ericsson MC218 pocket computer for writing stuff. Even wrote some of the content for 8-bit Memoirs on it. Now all I need on it is a CPC emulator, so I can develop a BASIC game when sitting on the bus. 

I'm thinking about creating a little app for cellphones though, to create CPC graphics, with export options like BASIC SYMBOL commands (4-color MODE 2, 16-color MODE 1, and standard modes too of course) and of course also as a byte array.
But it's the usual problem: Lots of ideas. No time.

4

Emulators / Re: easy to deploy JS CPC emulator?

« Last post by pmeier on Today at 10:24 »

No, Roland is written in Javascript and GLP'ed:
https://sourceforge.net/projects/emuscriptoria/
http://roland.retrolandia.net/

Just download the 6128s.html and _6128s.rom.
Install it on your Apache or run it locally with Firefox. (Other browsers seem more restrictive and require a web server.)

My Roland version supports touch controls: http://timealias.com/cpc/
Press F1 for instructions. (F8 for reset.)

5

Off topic / Re: Is anyone using apps on their phones for CPC development?

« Last post by Targhan on Today at 10:22 »

Obviously everyone will use their desktop PC when at home.

Well actually, no. Many people don't have desktops anymore to work, and are content with iPads and the like (or "decks" on which mobiles can be attached, with remote keyboard, mouse and screen).


But I actually bought a tablet with a Smart Pen to write down ideas, draw schemas and stuff. Very nice.

6

Amstrad CPC hardware / Re: Source for RAM ICs

« Last post by Bryce on Today at 09:46 »

For originality I'd choose the Mitsubishi 4164's as these are what the original Amstrads used. From a performance point of view they are all the same for a CPC.

Bryce.

7

Amstrad CPC hardware / Re: MCO122A Mainboard Factory Fixes

« Last post by Bryce on Today at 09:42 »

The jumpers are on every 6128+ as far as I know. They seem to be solving a ground loop issue. I've never tried, but my guess is that the disk drive becomes unstable if you remove them. I don't think they solve any RAM issue, they just happened to use the ground pin of the RAM IC because it was easy to access from above.
I've never looked into the other bodged resistors / diodes, so I've no idea what they are solving.

Bryce.

8

Programming / Re: Poll: Common Z80 Cross-Assemblers in use / WUDSN IDE

« Last post by JAC! on Today at 09:31 »

Thanks a lot you all you feedback so far.


My aim to to give people who'd like to start assembly coding a good and easy start.
Not to convince those who already built their own environment over the years.

Do you use Java Eclipse as your framwork?

More precisely I use the Eclipse Platform Runtime as the basis.
That is the core worspace/project/extension framework with comes with around 60MB and gives you everything you need.
My IDE has over 200 installations across all OS platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux) and targets.

Eclipse can die in a fire now. That monstrosity has caused me so much pain!

See above. People typically mix up the Eclipse JDT or J2EE Edition with tons of server relates stuff with the excellent core framework.
So no point in flaming Eclipse, really. I also use Qt and VS on a regular basis and their have their dark sides, too.


My summary so far:
PASMO looks OK, but there is only a beta and no development recently.
RASM looks very good for CPC, esp. because of the direct support for banks and the specific binary output formats and because it's in active development.
VASM looks more general (which make it also more complex) and I could not find the details on the output compatibility for CPC/ZX so far.


So for a ZX specific answer I'll do the same in WoS.


Thanks, again, JAC!

9

Emulators / Re: easy to deploy JS CPC emulator?

« Last post by mr_lou on Today at 08:17 »

Thanks, but that's Java. I'm looking for JavaScript.
Java doesn't run on any browser on any system I own.

Which systems are those?

10

Emulators / Re: easy to deploy JS CPC emulator?

« Last post by pelrun on Today at 04:37 »

I'm trying to have a few CPC programs run in browser-based emulators hosted on my own site. I've been able to do this easily for ZX Spectrum images with JSSpeccy, but the Amstrad emulators I've looked at have either source or instructions AWOL, or just plain huge (jsmess i am looking at you …).
Any suggestions for an easier installation?

@pmeier just got vvvv4k running online using Roland, so they might have some insight. I see that the source link on the Roland site is broken, as far as I can tell the current location is actually https://sourceforge.net/projects/emuscriptoria/.