How about something Meshy? Implement a Mesh network using a device such as the Particle WiFi Mesh Kit, Cypress CYBT-213043-MESH EZ-BT kit , or Raspberry Pi or even repurposed and old WiFi Router. related product. This could be for an irrigation system, environmental monitoring, Security and so on.
Also, IBM, in fact, was and built a 68000pc but when IBM asked Motorola for a pre-allotment, Moto said no! so IBM went to Moto little cousin Intel who said hell yes. having DOS was an accident. When I believe Digital Research CPM blew them off. The rest is history. LOL
Abandoning C for C++ is a mixed bag in my opinion. The temptations of C++ to abstract the operations and operators can cause a program or function to lose its self documenting ability. This is correctable with strong commenting and well thought out and implemented documentation (something I know everyone here follows).
Not sure about the example described by phoenixcomm , The way it is written uses post decrement on the a variable. C compilers should perform correctly as written, but that means the example would run 2,3,1,4,5. The 68xxx has a pre-decrement addressing mode, which is there so stack operations are more automated (pre-decrement, post-increment).
I did a significant amount of work with 68k series processors over the years, and agree they are significantly better than 808x series. I think the reason Intel was selected for IBM PC had something to do with marketing, not "who was first". Particularly since architecturally, the 68k was very much like the 360 mainframes. "How do you sell a $$MM$$ mainframe, if VM runs on a desktop?"
Rod with the compilers today you really almost don't need to use assembly at all. .
..
This all can be done in C.
I suppose the same argument could be made of C. With the advancements of the modern compilers, there really is no reason to write code in scary C instead of C++. However, this will be environmentally as well as company dependent. I know of a particular Music Instrument company that requires its Firmware Engineers to know and code in Assembly for DSP processing.
The correct tool is the one available and the one that does the job best.
BTW the only machine that I liked doing asm on was the 68xxx as its architecture, in fact, was orthogonal. so you could write this line of code: V++ = a--- * b++ which means in this order:
decrement a
multiply a times b
store solution in V
increment both V and b
fins.
That why the Spark CPUs from Sun were where so fast, it also helped that they had a separate math processor.
That is why in my opinion that the x86 architecture is so bad as its nothing new and it keeps the 8080 from the late '70s alive.
Rod with the compilers today you really almost don't need to use assembly at all. the biggest problem I have is sub-microsecond timing as the built-in library time() only returns things in the microsecond range. At that point, I found that it is easier to build a TTL based oscillator that is synced to time() which in turn gets set two ways one is via the keyboard/bios when you build the pc or you can be clever and set up which I call tic, toc from Simple Network Time Protocol (SNTP) servers which get their time from major time servers (like Bolder Co.) and then you, slave them and well life is good. In fact tic, toc becomes your network defacto time servers.
For instance, if I were in an aircraft, I could use tic, toc fed from two separate GPS receivers with data outputs, the antenna would have to be about 12 feet apart though.
Totally agree. The only time I revert to Assembly is with a new processor that requires a start up operation that needs to finish before other devices come on line.
Top Comments