SD Card Bootloaders that can be used with an NES controller?

Nick McClick

I've been plugging away at an open-source videogame console based on the Prop - a cheaper version of the hydra, it will have 2 NES controller jacks, composite video, audio, and an SD card slot.

A big hurdle for people who are beginning with the Prop (or other ucontrollers) is the programming hardware. Is there an open-source bootloader out there that can display a list of .binaries on an SD card on the TV, let the user select a binary with an NES controller, and then have the binary boot up? I know propdos does this, but it uses a keyboard.

Any suggestions?

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Mike Green

It would be easy enough to modify FemtoBasic to not require a keyboard and use the input from an NES controller to select one program from a list. Parallax had made a kiosk at one point to show one of several demo programs. FemtoBasic does have the ability to auto-run a program when it starts up and that could be the menu selector.

trodoss

@Nick,
Dosen't sound like that difficult of an app. Very similar to the Hydra's app that came with the SD card expansion. You could mod FemtoBasic to do that as Mike said.

I wrote a graphics editor for the Prop (http://forums.parallax.com/forums/default.aspx?f=33&m=377666) a while back ago that used both the NES/keyboard interface that even had a "keyboard" type selector for the NES. It could be, with a little modding, turned into something like what you are wanting.

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Oldbitcollector (Jeff)

@Nick..

Check your email.. Thanks to Jim Bagley

OBC

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Cluso99

Nick, not difficult at all. PropDos, PropCmd and SphinxOS all could be modified to do this. All currently list files and can run a binary (using a keyboard) so you would need to modify the keyboard driver to do something with the NES.

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· Prop Tools under Development or Completed (Index)
· Emulators: CPUs Z80 etc; Micros Altair etc;· Terminals·VT100 etc; (Index) ZiCog (Z80) , MoCog (6809)·
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trodoss

@OBC,
Should have figured Baggers had come up with something like that already [noparse];)[/noparse]

@Nick,
Forgot to say, but it sounds like a great project/product! You might want to get w/OBC, as he has been thinking about a "game kit" for the Hydra/Demo boards (see: http://forums.parallax.com/forums/default.aspx?f=33&m=396798).

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Karl Smith

Attached is my boot loader·that looks for all *.bin files on the SD card on pins 8-11, it can display up to 60 files on the screen, I have some commented code·that was going·to be for a file transfer but I never got·to finish it so I commented it out.

This code uses fsrw lib that was from FemtoBasic and a very old version of AiGeneric Text Driver that I changed for this project noteably the color ring on the edge of the font that bothered me.








Post Edited (Karl Smith) : 2/8/2010 2:05:23 PM GMT

Nick McClick

I was working on my own (almost done except for the UI), but Jim sent over the one he was working on, so I'm good to go - I'll add yours, Karl, as an option, too.

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Cluso99

Nick: On RamBlade I have used a miniature eeprom boot program to load a program from SD. This way the eeprom never requires changing. It loads and runs a binary file named in autoexec.bat or if that is not found a file called bootprop.bin

If you would like to use that method, the source is posted at the top of the RamBlade thread and is MIT. This way, the user can change the code on the SD without needing a PropPlug.

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Links to other interesting threads:

· Home of the MultiBladeProps: TriBlade,·RamBlade,·SixBlade, website
· Single Board Computer:·3 Propeller ICs·and a·TriBladeProp board (ZiCog Z80 Emulator)
· Prop Tools under Development or Completed (Index)
· Emulators: CPUs Z80 etc; Micros Altair etc;· Terminals·VT100 etc; (Index) ZiCog (Z80) , MoCog (6809)·
· Prop OS: SphinxOS·, PropDos , PropCmd··· Search the Propeller forums·(uses advanced Google search)
My cruising website is: ·www.bluemagic.biz·· MultiBlade Props: www.cluso.bluemagic.biz