Propeller as a BS1

hippy

I want to develop a programming language and a tool chain which will allow novice and less experienced programmers to utilise the Propeller without having to worry about learning Spin, Assembler or Objects.

I understand the arguments in favour of using Spin and Assembler, and the case against what I am proposing and in favour of other alternatives, but it is something I want to do and I do not really want to get bogged down in justifying my intentions.

I am thinking of a BS1-style language, initially converted to Spin as a simple language translator but would like to eventually move to generating raw eeprom images without using the Propeller Tool.

I understand Parallax does not document the Spin bytecode and I am prepared to put in the reverse engineering effort required but helping hands to save re-inventing the wheel are always welcome. It appears that www.sublab.net/spin.html has gone and the next best option is perhaps digging through Gear. A forum search and Googling turned up nothing else that seemed useful, but if anyone has any helpful pointers or advice they would be much appreciated.

Mike Green

If you're going to do a BS1-style language, I'd strongly suggest basing your tool chain on the Propeller itself. BS1 PBasic is simple enough that you could do a compiler in Spin. You could start off with a simple IDE that includes an interpreter (sort of like FemtoBasic), then later compile to either Spin byte code or your own interpretive code. Again, for a BS1-style language, you could do your own interpreter in assembly rather than use Spin's.

hippy

A propeller based solution is an idea, but I'd prefer to start with a PC-based system because I'd like to extend the programming language as I get more familiar with the Propeller myself and it seems an easier solution for sharing source files with others, and all the benefits that come with a PC-based IDE.

I probably will write some interpreter later and it is quite likely there will be some convergence. My principle was KISS, start with something which I know I can handle and build on that as I gain experience.