a few Hydra updates...

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Socoder -> Misc Gaming -> a few Hydra updates...
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 06:06
power mousey	hi everybody, here a few short updates on the Hydra: first, a more powerful,faster and advanced Basic is in the works...for a better name, Hydra Basic II. some of the reasons are: a lot of people really like and are having fun and learning the original Hydra Basic; Spin is a steep learning curve and has elements of both goodness and ugliness; Spin is not as appealing to a lot of beginners and intermediates while the assembly language is more appealing but unfortunately has a steeper learning curve; and also a lot of people like and want other languages available on and for the Hydra such as a Hydra C or more of a Pascal type of language too. When this more advanced and powerful Hydra Basic does come out... (and probably be both forms of being placed on a game cartride and also available to either upload from cart or download off net and into the Propeller IDE and in the directory where both Spin and the Propeller assembler reside)...I hope it incorporates some form of inline assembly. second, Chip Gracey...designer and creator of the Propeller chip is desigining the next advanced Propeller chip. It will come in as 40 pin dip....so when it does come out, we can purchase it and replace our existing propeller chip with a more advanced and powerful one. He is deciding with the new Propeller chip of 16 cogs of 128k system ram or just 8 cogs like the existing one but with system ram of 256k. yet, each cog would run about 160 MIPS rather than the current 20 MIPS. hey!, why not build both and have it available...or even a Propeller chip with up to 16 cogs and 256k ram. And also expand the size of the rom from 32k to at least 64k. new edit postey: you're so right agent smith. cheers, power mousey
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 08:39
Jayenkai	Aah, upgrades. The killer of all consoles. Kinda defeats the purpose of learning to code for a specific set of predetermined specs, if it's possible that those specs can be altered. Stick with the prebuilt single model, I say. -=-=- ''Load, Next List!''
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 09:28
power mousey	why can't he(Chip Gracey) just designed the original or even this new advanced propeller chip with just 8 cogs...but also a few more, maybe 2 or 3 where they are bloated cogs with a lot of general purose ram on their instruction registers??? you still activitate them and their last 16 instruction registers are still used for the other cogs(or main cog 0...which runs the Spin/assembler executor) so that these other instruction registers can be used for super,duoper fast time critical code and special needful data(Needful Things! ). coming back down to reality...and from Mount Olympus. cheers, power mousey
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 10:27
magicman	would you by any chance have a code example?
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 14:16
power mousey	well, I give you a short code example of a mix of Spin and assembly. However, be forewarned....even though Spin does have a good mixture of some Pascal and Basic elements...over-all its such a ugly language. And which, in a later blog I will discuss and rant and opinionate too. a code example and from the Hydra book: a complete "object" that is composed of a mixture of Spin and assembly. The code enables a cog(other than cog 0...the executor of SPin,asm, and your program) to control thru your program to blink off and on the Debug LED light. CON DEBUG_LED_PORT_MASK=$00000001 'debug LED is on I/O P0 VAR long cogon, cog PUB start(glow_led_parms_ptr) :okay ''start glowing LED- starts a cog ''returns false if no cog available '' stop okay:=cogon:=(cog:=cognew(@entry, glow_led_parms_ptr))>0 PUB stop ''Stops driver-frees a cog if cogon~ cogstop(cog) DAT org $000 'Entry point ' entry 'intialize debug LED or DIRA, #DEBUG_LED_PORT_MASK 'set pin output and OUTA, #!DEBUG_LED_PORT_MASK 'turn off led to start mov lptr, par 'copy parameter pointer 'to global pointer for 'future ref rdlong debug_led_inc, lptr 'now access main memory 'and retrieve the value :glow_loop 'add the current brightness to the counter add debug_led_ctr, debug_led_brightness wc 'based on carry turn LED on/off if_c or OUTA, #DEBUG_LED_PORT_MASK if_nc and OUTA, #!DEBUG_LED_PORT_MASK 'update brightness and invert increment if we hit 0 add debug_led_brightness, debug_led_inc wz if_z neg debug_led_inc, debug_led_inc ' loop and do forever and ever jmp #:glow_loop '//Variables//////////////////////////////////////////// debug_led_ctr long $00000000 'PWM counter debug_led_inc long $00000000 'inc to add to counter debug_led_brightness long $00000000 'current bright level lptr long $00000000 'general long pointer --v whew!!!! let me just say this: I will be glad when this more advanced and powerful Hydra Basic will come out. As well as a Hydra C or even Hydra Forth too. true. Just with this Spin and also a mixture of Spin and assembly of the propeller...DBPRO has never looked so good. cheers, power mousey
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 15:49
steve_ancell	Ere mousey ! Could you clarify what you mean by cogs ? Cheerz Steve.
Sun, 26 Nov 2006, 16:04
Jayenkai	Glad someone else asked that
Mon, 27 Nov 2006, 02:11
Yayyak	AFAIK, the Propellor chip is made up of several parallel processing cores, and each core is called a 'cog'. Sounds like somebody let the marketing department design the processor .
Mon, 27 Nov 2006, 08:34
power mousey	sorry guys for not getting back in such a while or time. been working, and on the night shift too. had a lot of work...<shakes head and rolls eyes>. Our welcoming back gift to work. yes, steve and jay: as yakyak mentioned....the cogs are the core processors or cpus/microprocessors in this case. I also caught your joke and as well as your insight, yakyak. true. hey agent smith, thank you very much. in the first place, I wish Andre would've told us (at both Xgamestation and then Parallax) about the advanced Hydra Basic in the works and as well as this. Rather than just telling and encouraging us that Spin and asm are the way to go. Not all of us are little Andre clones....with both programming-->if if its just some and/or beginning or intermediate with programming and also trying to fit us into his master cog of electronics,hardware, and electrical engineering. But I'm getting way ahead of myself....will save this and expand on this further and in another blog sometime. Yet, start us out with some of the hardware and architecture of both the Hydra and the propeller chip...which I like and is both educational,fun and also strains the brain. Yet, from loading and running games ,apps, and demos from either the cartridge, or the onboard 128k EEPROM, and/or even thru the Propeller IDE upload of PC host to Hydra client and the resulting 32k binary image to be loaded and run is either into the game cartridge and loaded via from cartridge into 32k system ram...or just from the onboard 128k EEPROM and then loaded into the 32k system ram. And also playing around and coding in and with the Hydra Tiny Basic...and then a very steep learning curve into the good,bad,ugly of Spin and also into the better asm...but unfortunately vast steeper and deeper area of learning and application. new squeak!--> by the way, agent smith, hyrule, hoboben, diablosdevil(yes, you do have some valid points dude, true), and everybody....I'm thinking of having my family hold off on the purchase or ordering of the Hydra. I still have the book...and there is a wealth of knowledge and information contained within. Mostly cause, until some better and.or more powerful programming languages come out for it. I'm just not convinced with Spin. asm is beter but there is a steeper learning curve and is much harder to learn and apply. bewildered and confused, huh!? and squeak!! power mousey
Mon, 27 Nov 2006, 14:54
power mousey	agent smith, this Forth that Andre mentions for the Hydra.....is it available for purchase and/or for download? and Andre better 'get on the ball' or hurry up and get this new advanced and more powerful Hydra Basic. I think that a lot of people are going to be turned off with Spin and probably the asm as well...although the asm looks better but has a deeper learning curve and is way much,much harder than Spin. And Spin, to be honest, is pretty horrible. hey, at least some people want a powerful, flexible and easy programming language. I know I do. And then later on and whenever they want and like...get into something more powerful but much harder and advanced. some people from the Xgamestation site and a few from the Parallax site want and like either some kind of advanced Hydra Basic or Hydra C....and, with some form of inline assembly. just take a look at Pure Basic...which has inline assembly, is easy or easier to learn than from Spin, and also compiles and makes your program executables small and tight too. again, I still have the book and will read up and study more... maybe and eventually get into this Spin and then the asm. Yet, I'll hold off until this advanced Hydra Basic and/or even a Hydra C comes out. I cannot see nor fiqure out of going from a level of a beginning or intermediate programmer and also of loading and running some games, then to coding with the Hydra Tiny Basic and then from there to a steep hill/mountain of Spin and then from there to a bigger Mount Olympus of the asm. A few other programming languges should be inserted around the middle...starting form the the Hydra Tiny Basic, then the middle languages such as advanced HYdra Basic, Forth and even Hydra C, and then when you are ready and have learned a lot: both Spin and asm. Besides... the animation bug has bit me again. And I'm getting back into 3d graphics,animation, and 3d programming and with both Blitz3d and Dark Basic. cheers, power mousey
Mon, 27 Nov 2006, 15:38
power mousey	yes, agent smith I know that the Hydra is a hobbyist and 'hacker' machine. but to present it to people..who are beginning programmers or have programmed in such languages as Basic, C, or even Java or Delphi. that, that even a 12 year old can sit dowm and learn game programming and code in Spin and asm. um!! thats an exaggeration and maybe..just maybe an misrepresentation! I think and feel that some, at least, will be downright disappointed and frustrated with--> from the easy level of Hydra Ting Basic and then accerelate into high steep gear to both Spin and higheset hard steepest gear of the asm. just wait and see. again, some intermediary forms of programming languages are needed and will be appreciated such as this Forth and this up and coming advanced Hydra Basic. don't get me wrong. I still do like the Hydra and will eventually get the thing. But for now, I'm having second thoughts on the purchase of it and ordering of it for this time period. For now, I would rather prefer a good,stable, quality laptop from Santa. true. I'm looking forward to this Forth too...but also the advanced Hydra Basic or even a Hydra C and hopefully with inline assembly of sorts and for an ease of introduction into the asm. Then from there...getting into the asm for both the Hydra and the propeller chip. cheers, power mousey
Mon, 27 Nov 2006, 18:21
power mousey	agent smith, true and I agree with you that most of the retro games were programmed in assembly lange. and also that you only want to use HLL then might as well as use your PC. true. but also you can also use your PC to download,run and learn assembly from a variety of freely available assemblers, emulators, and simulators. and also you can code in these assemblers and simulators to create and play retro game clones. and even run these emulators to actually run and play these retro games too. yet, one thing I like about the Hydra and aslo the propeller chip is both a little of the hardware but primarily the software and their aspects of multiprocessing, parallel programming and the architecture of the propeller chip itself. I will eventually get the Hydra...and no doubt I really like the Hydra and especially the propeller chip it contains. Its just I learn and apply myself better with a building block...and step by step learning and application approach. I'm also sensing and experiencing 'deja vu' over this Hydra and especially with the Spin...which supposedly is supposed to be HLL...and the asm as with the XGS micro and pico. That there was more hardware involved rather than software. And with the Hydra, its supposed to be a little of the hardware and more of the software. I hardly see no difference. Yet, with some time constraints and busy at work and with some other interests and hobbies ...and a few other things: I have little time to dwell deeply into the innards of just Spin and the asm. Believe me its presented as easy....although I do like some of the Pascal and Basic elements... yet, its not HLL and asm looks better but is much harder. Eventually I will get the Hydra. But I'm more interested in 3d graphics and animation....and for Blitz3d, BlitzMax 3d?, and even Dark Basic. And also with Maplet and trial versions of both 3d World Studio and a few other modellers and graphic engines. I will have my hands plenty full. agent smith, have fun,enjoy and definitely learn about the Hydra and the propeller chip...and especially Spin too. hey, tell me and all of us about Spin and the asm too. okay? true. maybe a lot of blog times with Spin and asm? cheers, power mousey