From: raymoon@ms1.dgsys.com (Raymond Moon)
Newsgroups: alt.lang.asm,comp.lang.asm.x86,news.answers,alt.answers,comp.answers
Subject: x86 Assembly Language FAQ - General Part 3/3
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Date: 23 Nov 1998 18:08:39 GMT
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Reply-To: raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Summary: This is the FAQ for the x86 Assembly Language programmers for the alt.lang.asm and comp.lang.asm.x86 newsgroups. This particular section of the FAQ is part three of three parts that contain x86 assembly language information common to all assemblers.
Keywords: x86 Assemby Language ASM FAQ General
Archive-Name: assembly-language/x86/general/part3
Posting-Frequency: monthly (21st of every month)
Last-modified: 1998/11/23
------------------------------
Subject: 26. WWW Assembly HomePages REVISED
26.1 CAUTION
All of the web sites listed here are maintained by individuals. I will
strive to maintain this list current but do not be surprised if the
addresses no longer are current.
26.2 ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE RELATED HOME PAGES
Randy Hyde's Assembly Language Page
http://cuda.ucr.edu/Page_asm
Excellent tutorial, Art of Assembly Language
ASM Style Guide
Christian Ludoff's 80x86 Sandpile Page
http://www.sandpile.org Basic Page
http://www.sandpile.org/80x86/overview.shtml
The second page is where you should kept you link. Much good
information is available at this site.
EG3 Electronic Communication's Electronic Engineer's Toolbox
http://www.eg3.com/softd/assembly.htm
Assembly Language Hot Lists and Major Resources.
Robert Collins' x86 Monthly Digest
http://www.x86.org/
Intel processor bugs
Intel data sheets and programming manuals
In-Depth articles
Productivity ehancements and programming tips
Rober Collins' Dr. Dobb's Journal Undocumented Corner.
Much more
Jannes Faber's Assembly home page
http://www.fys.ruu.nl/~faber/Amain.html
List of ASM Books with short reviews
A few hints and tricks
Complete source code to some of his programs
A listing of EMS Professional Shareware products
Ray Rose's HTML For Assembler home page
http://www.alaska.net/~rrose/assembly.htm
An extensive list of ASM books without descriptions
Links to alt.lang.asm, comp.lang.asm.x86, and
alt.msdos.programmer
newsgroups.
Link to the Yahoo/Computers and Internet/Languages/Assembly page
(see below)
NASM: The Netwide Assembler Project
http://www.cryogen.com/nasm
A group of programmers are writing a new assembler. This home page
describes the project and where to download the latest version.
Michael Babcock's Programming Home Page (many broken links on pages)
http://w3.tyenet.com/mbabcock/mtb.programming.html
This home page has links to:
Optimizing 803/4/586 ASM Programming
http://w3.tyenet.com/mbabcock/prg.optimize.html
ASM Tutorial
http://w3.tyenet.com/mbabcock/prg.asmtut1.html
Utilities
http://w3.tyenet.com/mbabcock/prg.utils.html
The Official Web Shareware Site
http://www.jumbo.com/pages/programming/dos/asmutl/
This site appears to have a few asm files not on SimTel.
Dr. ASM's Assembly Home Page
http://web.syr.edu/~dbgrandi/assembly.htm
Some answered questions and links to other assembly related sites.
James Vahn's 80xxx Snippets - 80x86 Assembly Language Enthusiasts
http://www.cet.com/~jvahn
Download snippets & Booklist
Kip Irvine's Assembly Language Sources
http://www.nuvisionmiami.cim/kip/asm.htm
Gavin Estey's Home
http://www.strangecreations.com/library/assembly/index.htm
His ASM tutorial, other ASM Links, FAQs and Optimizations
Grzegorz Mazur's x86 CPU Stuff
http://grafi.ii.pw.edu.pl/gbm/x86/index.html
x86 CPU identification algorithms
Cyrix/IBM5x86/6x86 (and 486) control program
Links to other information on x86 family CPUs
Heath Holcomb's x86 Assembly Page
http://www.wfu.edu/~holcojh5/x86asm/x86asm.html
Some pointers on what is assembly language, what is assembly
good for, and what do you need to get started.
Pointers to ASM Tutorial, this FAQ, other ASM web pages
Eric Isaacson's A86 Assembler and D86 Debugger Page
http://eji.com/a86/index.htm
Overviews of a86 and a386 assemblers, d86 and d386 debuggers,
download and purchase of a86 and d86.
Tore Nilsson's Assembly Tutorial Page
http://www.ice-digga.com/programming/
VLA's Assembly and DMA programming tutorials, Asphyxia's VGA
tutorials, and some graphics and sound programming
information.
Gerd Kortemeyer's 387/486DX/Pentium/Floating Point Processor Stuff
http://www.nscl.msu.edu/~kortemey/copro.html
A collection of assembler routines written for Turbo Pascal
and C++. Most of the comments are in German after an English
introduction.
Cameron's 386+ Programming Page NOT CURRENTLY WORKING
http://free.prohosting.com/~cameron/
32 bit DOS extender/Utilities/pmode extender
File formats and specifications/Game programming
Knowledge Base with ASM tutorials, Denthor's VGA Trainer and
Univ. of Guadalajara ASM tutorial
Peter's PMODE Home Page
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Peaks/1231/
Pmode tutorials and programming related files
Niko Komin's Assembler for PCS page
http://www.inx.de/~nkomin/html/assembe.htm
Shareware, pmode, x86 mnemonics, ASM related links.
Alexandre Zvenigorosky III's Programs for PC 386+
http://www.cpod.com/monoweb/zveni/prg.html
Zvenigorosky's assembler and debugger, currently
documentation only in French.
Rich Elber's ValArrow (286 Assembler) Page
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Heights/7052/valarr2.html
Links to Arrowsoft Assembler, ZD86 debugger, discussion of
Arrowsoft's Assemblers deviations from MASM.
Kurt I. Groenbech's Alab Homepage
http://www.nano.no/~espeng/alab/
Home page for the Assembler Laboratory that is an IDE for
assemblers
Christian Kurzke's Advanced x86 Assembly Programming
http://wwwcip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de/user/cnkurzke/hwkmcs/index.html
Excerpts from lessons given at Adalbert Stifter Gymnasium in
1989
Bob Richardson's PC Assembly Language Page
http://lexitech.com/bobrich/
Eighteen topics taken from his SELFIN PC Assembly Language
Group.
Jesper Pedersen's Processor Information Page
http://www.imada.ou.dk/~jews/PInfo/intel.html
List of instructions and opcodes used by Intel, AMD, Cyrix
and Nexgen.
Quantasm's x86 and Pentium Programming Tips and Info
http://www.quantasm.com/freeinfo.html
Steve Kemp's Assembly Language Programming Index (Not currently
working)
http://www.dcs.ed.ac.uk/home/skx/asm/index.html
Assembly Language Newbie information. A86 Source Code
Ferdi Smit's Assemble It! Page
http://www.xs4all.nl/~smit/
His own source code, 3D programming, his own ASM tutorial,
optimization and other information.
Paul Hsieh's x86 Assembly Language Page
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/9498/asm.html
Feature articles, Optimization and General
Programming/References
Jaap Harm's 80x86 Assembly Page (Not currently working)
http://home.worldonline.nl/~jaapharm/
Tutorial, source code and links
Charles Winner s ASM Resources (Not currently working)
http://www.cse.utoledo.edu/%7Ecwinner/assembly.html
G. Adam Stanislav's Whiz Kid Technomagic
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Heights/7394/
Win95 Assembly Language source code examples
John Eckerdal's Assembly Page
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Park/6452/index.html
Nice collection of Assembly Gems.
Gaz's Little Web Programming Page
http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/fatbit/427/programming.html
Protected Mode Tutorial and large library of NASM source code
written for the WDosX 32 bit DOS extender
Christopher Giese's Triple Fault Club
http://www.netwurx.net/~geezer/os/index.htm
NASM and DJGPP Code, Protected Mode Code, OS Code
The Bass Demon's Operating System Theory Page
http://home.c2i.net/tkjoerne/os/index.htm
Information on Hard Disks, Partitioning and Booting, FAT
specific filesystem information, Filesystem theory article,
Available assembler source codes and Memory Management
OS Development Page
http://milkyway.isa.net.au/os-dev/index2.html
Documentation, Links, Source files, Bulletin Board
The NASM Advocate
http://people.mw.mediaone.net/nasm/index.html
NASM source code, documentation (HTML format), NASM specific
IDE, NASM Links, NASM Mailing List and NASM Mailing List
Archives
Anthony's Programming Page:
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Network/4311/
Home of ALINK. ALINK is a linker that I am writing, to link
object files into executable programs. The ultimate purpose
is to write a free and portable linker to go with NASM, which
can link all the NASM output formats into any one of a number
of possible executable formats, so that the pair provide a
portable assembler and linker for Intel CPUs on any OS.
Craig Peacock's Interfacing the PC Page
http://www.senet.com.au/~cpeacock/
Much information about interfacing with the parallel and
serial ports, information about IRQs and AT keyboards, and
many links to more technical information.
Chris Dragan's Home Page
http://ams.ampr.org/cdragan/
His own programs and assembler source code, Win32 programs.
David Lindauer's Computer Page
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Station/5196/treasure.html
Windows Assembly Demo for TASM
David Lindauer's LADSoft Computer Page NEW
http://members.tripod.com/~ladsoft/
Jan Wagemakers' Linux and Assembler Home Page
http://bewoner.dma.be/JanW/eng.html
Brennan's Guide to Inline Assembly
http://www.rt66.com/~brennan/djgpp/bgtia.html
Information on AT&T syntax
Dr. Carter's PC Assembly Programming Code Page
http://www.comsc.ucok.edu/~pcarter/pcasm/code/
Much NASM code
Gustavo Net's ASM page
http://www.gustavo.net/programming/asm.shtml
Links to tutorials, Programmer's Forum, source code, and
more.
Henry S. Takeuchi's Windows 95 Assembly Language Programming
http://www.eskimo.com/~htak/win95asm/win95asm.htm
Source code and tutorial
Glenn Strycker's The International Brotherhood of Assembly/Machine
Programmers (IBAMP) NEW
http://www.members.kconline.com/strycker/IBAMP/index.html
Assembly Chat and Forum, links, source code
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 23 Nov 98
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 27. Common Reason Why Memory Allocation Fails
27.1 BACKGROUND A common error received when first learning to use Int 21h Function 48h, allocate memory, is error code 8, insufficient memory available. Usually, the programmer then writes a small program that only allocates memory, and the program still fails. This situation is quite puzzling because there should be hundreds of kilobytes of memory available but this function reports that there is insufficient memory for a few hundred bytes. The reason is that DOS generally allocates all available memory above the loaded program to that program. Therefore, there is no more memory to allocate, so the request fails. 27.2 .COM FILES Since a .COM file does not contain any header information, the DOS loader has no way of determining how much memory is required for a program beyond the physical size of the program. Even this number is deceptive because it does not include a stack. Therefore, DOS always allocates all available memory above the program to the program. To use the allocate memory function, the programmer must release that extra memory using Int 21h Function 4ah, Set Memory Block Size. Given that generally there is more that 64 Kbytes of memory, the DOS sets Stack Top to just under that value, it is generally safe to release all memory above 64 Kbytes. 27.3 .EXE FILES The amount of memory the DOS allocates to the loaded program depends upon a value in the .EXE header. This value is called Maximum Allocation and is a word starting at offset 12. This value specifies the number of 16-byte paragraphs beyond the image size wanted by the program to execute. This value must be equal or greater than the Minimum Allocation, which is the number of 16-byte paragraphs beyond the image size required by the program to execute. This space generally contains uninitialized variables and the stack. The value of Maximum Allocation is set by the /CPARM Option for the Microsoft Linker. By default, the linker sets this value to 0ffffh which will causes DOS to allocate the largest block of available memory. This memory can be used as a heap, print buffer, etc. 27.4 DETERMINING HOW MUCH MEMORY IS AVAILABLE TO A PROGRAM In the PSP, at offset 02h, DOS loads a word which is the segment address of the next Memory Control Block or Arena. Subtracting the PSP from that value at offset 02h will be the number of memory paragraphs allocated to the program. The number of bytes can be calculated by shifting that number to the left by 4 bits, multiplying by 16, the size of a memory paragraph. 27.5 HOW TO DEALLOCATE MEMORY AT THE START OF A PROGRAM If you want to load and execute another program, you must release memory to make room for the program. Also, since the largest chunk of memory is allocated already to the program, all requests to allocate memory generally fail. Again, to use the allocate memory function, the programmer must release the extra memory above the program use as for a .COM file above. The problem here is where is the end of the program. The answer is not as simple as with the .COM file. There are two basic solutions. 1. If you use the .dosseg option, the Microsoft Linker will define a label, _end, at the end of the DGROUP. Since the .dosseg option also places any FAR data segments between the code and DGROUP segments, you can release all memory above that label. 2. If you do not want or are unable to use the first option, use an include file which declares all segments used by your program. Define a label in the last segment and use it as the _end label in the first example. Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 26 Dec 95 Return to the Table Of Contents
------------------------------
Subject: 28. Volume Serial Numbers
28.1 VOLUME SERIAL NUMBER FORMAT
The volume serial number was introduced with DOS 4.0 as part of an
extended boot record and is created through you either FORMAT a disk
or use DISKCOPY to create another disk. The serial number is a
function of the time/date of the formatting or the diskcopying. Note
that DISCOPY generates a new volume serial number so a DISKCOPY is
not an exact image of the source diskette.
28.2 CALCULATING THE VOLUME SERIAL NUMBER
For example, say a disk was formatted on 26 Dec 95 at 9:55 PM and
41.94 seconds. DOS takes the date and time just before it writes it
to the disk.
Low order word is calculated: Volume Serial Number is:
Month & Day 12/26 0c1ah
Sec & Hundrenths 41:94 295eh 3578:1d02
-----
3578h
High order word is calculated:
Hours & Minutes 21:55 1537h
Year 1995 07cbh
-----
1d02h
Note that DOS interrupt 21h Functions 2ah, Get DOS Date, and 2ch, Get
DOS
Time, are particularly suited to getting the date and time for
calculating the Volume Serial Number.
28.3 READING AND SETTING THE VOLUME SERIAL NUMBER
To read the Volume Serial Number, use the IOCTL call, int 21h
function 440dh Minor Code 66h, Get Media ID. To write the Volume
Serial Number, use the IOCTL call, int 21h function 440dh Minor Code
46h, Set Media ID.
WARNING! These IOCTL calls use a structure that also contain the
volume label and file system type. So that you do not create errors
with these values, I recommend that you always Minor Code 66h to
initialize the structure before setting the Volume Serial Number to
a new value and writing it back to the disk.
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 17 Feb 96
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 29. .obj File Format REVISED
29.1 INTEL
There are two sources for this information. The first is available
from Intel. The Tools Interface Standards Committee has prepared the
following documents:
ftp://ftp.intel.com/pub/tis/omf11g.zip
The readme file in each .zip file states that the document is the
Relocatable Object Module Format Specification, V1.1.
Unfortunately, both files unzip into documents formatted for
Postscript printers. Adobe's Acrobat can not display them, but
Ghostscript can. If you need GhostScript, you can get it from the
following site. Read the ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/pub/ghost/aladdin
29.2 MICROSOFT
The second is from Microsoft. This file is located at:
ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/ss0288.exe
This file expands into ascii text files that are the Microsoft
Product Support Services Application Note: Relocatable Object Module
Format. These files date from 1992. Also included is the .lib file
format and the CodeView extensions.
29.3 COFF format
This information is specific for DJGPP COFF but is this the same as
used by Microsoft (I believe)
http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/doc/coff/
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 25 Oct 98
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 30. Rebooting from Software
30.1 WARM AND COLD REBOOT
Within DOS, there are two types of rebooting. There is the warm
reboot that is evoked by pressing the "Ctrl-Alt-Del" key combination.
During this reboot, all Power On System Tests, POSTs, are performed
with the exception of the memory tests. In addition to the POSTs,
interrupt vectors are reinitialized and system timers reinitialized.
In other words, the BIOS code initializes the computer system to such
a state that the computer system is ready for loading the operating
system. The loading of the operating system is done by issuing an
interrupt 19h.
The second type of rebooting is a cold reboot that occurs when the
system is turned on. The only difference between a cold reboot and a
warm reboot is the performing of the memory tests.
30.2 PERFORMING A REBOOT FROM SOFTWARE
Whether a cold or warm reboot is performed depends upon the value if
the the reset flag in the ROM BIOS data area. If this flag is set to
1234h, a warm reset is performed. An any other value results in a
cold reboot. Usually a zero is loaded for the cold reboot. Code
snippets to do this are:
ROMBIOS_DATA segment at 0400h
org 72h
ResetFlag dw ?
ROMBIOS_DATA ends
ROMBIOS segment at 0f000h
org 0fff0h
Reset label far
ROMBIOS ends
In your code:
mov ax, seg ROMBIOS_DATA
mov ds, ax
ASSUME ds:ROMBIOS_DATA
mov ResetFlag, 1234h ; or 0 if cold reset is desired
jmp Reset
30.3 WARNINGS!
Neither the warm nor the cold boot flushes buffers, system, smartdrv,
and
EMM386, or notifies TSRs. This can lead to lost of data. The best
source code that takes most of this into account is:
ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/bootutil/reboot33.zip
Full souce code is available.
30.4 JUST USING INT 19H
Using this interrupt alone will only reload the operating system onto
a computer system that may not be properly initialized for it. The
interrupt vectors are not reset but the TSRs that have hooks into the
interrupt table may be overwritten. Obviously, this can lead to the
system hanging if one of these hooked and overwritten interrupts is
called. Other problems can be timers not reset or add-on cards not
reinitialized properly. So, do NOT use int 19h to reboot the
computer.
30.5 USING F000:E05B INSTEAD OF F000:FFF0 AS THE JUMP ADDRESS
In the original IBM ROM BIOS, the instruction at f000:fff0 was a long
jump to f000:e05b. Some programs skipped the jump at f000:fff0 and
went directly to the second address which is the start of the reset
procedure in ROM BIOS. I checked my 386 with non IBM BIOS, and the
start of the reset procedure is at the same address. I believe that
using the second address is dangerous because there is not any
guarantee that it will stay the same. Also, if you are rebooting the
computer what is the reason in saving a few cycles! Stay with the
address f000:fff0 as the jump there always will take the execution
path to the correct code.
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 20 Dec 96
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
31.1 COMP.OS.MSDOS.PROGRAMMER
This excellent FAQ is posted every 20 days to
comp.os.msdos.programmer,
comp.answers and news.answers newsgroup.
It is available from
ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet-by-group/comp.os.msdos.programmer/
31.2 COMMUNICATIONS FAQS
The following websites contains many links to communication and
hardware related FAQs, e.g., serial port, game port, keyboard, modem,
and LANs. Most of these FAQs are not approved FAQs so are not found
at rtfm.mit.edu but that is not to say that these are not quality
FAQs. There is much good information.
http://www.webcom.com/~llarrow/comfaqs.html
http://www.repairfaq.com/filipg/LINK/F_LINKIN.html#LINKIN_003
http://www2.psyber.com/~tcj/faqnfile.html
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 25 Oct 98
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 32. Pseudo Random Number Generator in Assembly Language
Mark Adler wrote a set or pseudo random number generators based upon
algorithms from Knuth's "Art of Computer Programming", vol 2, 2nd ed.
The file comes with full assembly source and .obj files for all major
memory models. While written to link with Turbo C, the .obj files
when linked with Microsoft C worked well, except for the procedure
that return a double random number. The reason was because the return
protocol is different between Borland C and Microsoft C. Once the
code was modified to work with Microsoft C, the code worked well.
To test the algorithms, I created an array of 100 random numbers and
then generated random numbers and tried to determine if the original
pattern was ever repeated. My program kept the length of the longest
matching series. For real or double, the longest matching series was
one after more that a billion random numbers. For ints, 0 and 1 as
the only selections produced the longest matching series of 31 matches
after more than a billion random numbers. Increasing the range of
acceptable numbers quickly reduced the longest matching series to 2 in
over 250 million random numbers. My short testing revealed that the
longest matching series seldom increased after this number.
Lastly, to test the distribution, I counted the number of hits for
each number between 0 and 100. I collected about 100,000 hits for
each number. The standard deviation was only 319 or less than 0.33%.
While my testing was not a rigorous mathematical testing of the
algorithm and its implementation, I believe for most uses, these
procedures are adequate.
The file is available:
ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/turbo_c/tcrnd11.zip
Note that the description of this file is inaccurate.
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 4 May 96
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 33. Command Line Arguments
33.1 WHERE IS THE COMMAND LINE DOS loads the command line into the PSP. The length of the command line is stored in a byte at offset 80h. The command line is stored in the next 127 bytes starting at 81h. As, generally, there is a space between the filename and the start of the command line argument, a space usually is the first character in this string. The string is terminated with a carriage return character, 0dh. At startup for both .COM and .EXE format programs, DS and ES point to the PSP. 33.2 HOW TO ACCESS THE COMMAND LINE ARGUMENTS See Subject #8, How to Redirect Stderr to a File. I have written a demonstration program that contains assembly language startup code that parses the command line arguments onto the stack and provides them as argc and *argv[] to the main procedure. Anyone interested in accessing command line arguments should look at this code. Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 15 Jun 96 Return to the Table Of Contents
------------------------------
Subject: 34. Free 32 bit and DJGPP Assemblers
34.1 Brennan Underwood's Guide to Inline Assembly under DJGPP.
This is an introduction to inline assembly under DJGPP and is based
upon GCC. The AT&T/UNIX syntax is explained. The URL is:
http://www.rt66.com/~brennan/djgpp/bgtia.html
34.2 DJGPP QUICK ASM PROGRAMMING GUIDE
Andrew Ly has a web page covering:
URLs to FAQs
AT&T x86 ASM Syntax
Some inline ASM information
converting .obj/.lib files
The URL to this page is:
www.castle.net/~avly/djgpp.html
34.3 FREE 32-BIT X86 ASSEMBLER FAQ/LINUX X86 ASSEMBLY HOWTO
Francois-Rene Rideau has authored a FAQ on free 32-bit assemblers or
Linus x86 Assembly HowTo. It is available:
http://www.eleves.ens.fr:8080/home/rideau/Assembly-HOWTO
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 19 Jun 96
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 35. TERSE Programming Language
Jim Neil has just announced his TERSE Programming Language. TERSE
gives all of the control available in assembly language with the
look-and-feel and ease-of-use found in high-level languages.
It is available:
http://www.terse.com
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last changed: 19 Aug 96
Return to the Table Of Contents------------------------------
Subject: 36. Assembly Language IDEs
36.1 ASMEDIT
ASMEDIT is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for Assembly
Language programmers. This IDE has a build in editor that provides
syntax coloring, editing of files up to 256 Mbytes, dissammembly of
short code pieces, and shelling to run external assemblers, linkers,
debuggers and make programs.
The real benefit of ASMEDIT is its extensive help. This help covers:
80x86 ASM mnemonics up to 686 including FPU and MMX;
Complete Opcode Tables;
BIOS Interrupts;
DOS Interrupts and DOS Functions;
EMS and Mouse Functions;
BIOS and DOS Data Structures;
Diagnostic Codes; and
VGA programming information.
ASMEDIT is available from simtel or any of its mirrors:
ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/aedt182.zip
36.2 ALAB
Assembler Laboratory is an assembler IDE, packed with nice features
such as:
syntax and error highlighting
proc, macro and data browsers
tasm, masm, a86 and dlink support
heuristic scan
opcode help, extended ascii chart, scan codes, calculator
much more!
The latest version is available from the author's homepage:
http://www.nano.no/~espeng/alab/
36.3 ASMIDE
The latest version of ASMIDE, 4.01, has the following features:
contains all the features of a conventional editor, such as
Finding, Replacing, Cutting, Copying, Pasting.
has the ability to open multiple files, allowing you to transfer
text between the files. Multiple windows can be Tiled or
Cascaded, and features Scroll bars.
has mouse support.
features a simple, 4 function, 3 mode calculator, and an Ascii
Chart.
has menu systems allowing you to assemble, link, run and debug
your program. Short cut keys are also provided.
allows you to specify your own assembler, linker and debugger in
the configuration file.
features setup dialogs that provide support for TASM, TLINK, MASM
and LINK.
ASMIDE is available:
http://www.inx.de/~nkomin/files/asmide.arj
36.4 NASMIDE
NASM-IDE is a front end for NASM which allows multiple files to be
worked on within the same editing environment. Written in Turbo
Pascal and Turbo Vision, the NASM-IDE interface is clear and
straightforward. Features include:
Turbo Vision point-and-click style interface
Automatic syntax highlighting of source code
An ASM Assistant to guide users through the creation of assembler
projects
On-line help system
Support for three main output file formats - flat file binary and
DOS 16 bit and Win32 object files
Learn more about NASIDE and download it from:
http://www.inglenook.co.uk/nasmide/index.html
36.5 MicroASM
MicroASM is written by Ole Saether. It is a Windows 95 & NT windows
editor with support for MS-DOS command line assemblers.
With MicroAsm you can:
Create and edit text files.
Run the files through your favorite command-line assembler.
Automatically highlight lines containing errors.
To learn more about it and download it, visit:
http://home.eunet.no/~oleset/microasm.htm
36.6 TASM IDE
Joost Vrielink has developed a Turbo Assembler IDE. It is free for
downloading from his web site:
http://www.angelfire.com/in/tasm
The IDE is an editor just like WordPad, but compile/link/run/debug can
be accomplished with just one click It also has a built-in
dec/hex/bin/oct converter, and syntax highlighting is almost finished.
It is perfectly suited to make simple 16-bit DOS programs within the
Windows 95/98 environment. Changes are being added quite often, so
remember to return and check every now and then.
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 19 Sep 98
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
38.1 Review of Disassemblers
Jerzy Tarasiuk has reviewed some commercial and shareware
disassemblers. The shareware assemblers are available in this
directory. The review is available:
ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/disasm/aabstrct.txt
Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 13 Oct 96
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
Subject: 38. How to Optimize for the Pentium
39.1 PENTIUM OPTIMIZATION SITE
The below site is updated as new information becomes available and
contains information not found elsewhere.
http://announce.com/agner/assem
38.2 LITERATURE AVAILABLE FROM INTEL
Much useful literature can be downloaded for free from Intel's www
site:
http://www.intel.com
The documents are in various different file formats. If a particular
document is in a format not supported by your word processing software
then you may seek an appropriate file viewer somewhere on the
Internet. Many software companies are offering such file viewers for
free to support their file formats.
Tutorials for Optimizing the Pentium, and Pentium Pro/Pentium II can
be downloaded from:
http://developer.intel.com/design/perftool/cbts/pentopt/index.htm
http://developer.intel.com/design/perftool/cbts/pproopt/index.htm
Manuals for the Pentium and Pentium Pro processors can be downloaded
from:
http://developer.intel.com/design/pentium/manuals/
http://developer.intel.com/design/pro/manuals/
Detailed information on the MMX processors can be found in the
documents:
"MMX Technology Developers Guide", and "Programmers Reference Manual",
both of which are available from:
http://developer.intel.com/drg/mmx/manuals/
Many other sources other than Intel also have useful information. I
would particularly recommend:
http://www.x86.org.
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 20 Dec 97
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
Subject: 39. Assembly Language Programming Style Guidelines
Randy Hyde has done it again. He has written a style guide that will
help you write more readable and maintainable assembly language code.
The URL is:
http://cuda.ucr.edu/Page_softeng/sample.html
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 21 May 97
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
Subject: 40. Other Assembly-Related Newsgroups
Here are some other assembly language newsgroups that may be of
interest.
news:msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.masm
news:forums.borland.com/borland.public.tasm
news:fido7.talks-asm
news:alt.os.assembly
news:alt.os.development
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 26 Dec 97
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
41.1 DESCRIPTION
ZD86 is a full featured Assembler Debugging Environment, that provides
Symbolic Debugging for most common Assemblers, including A86, MASM,
TASM, etc. The symbolic debugging capability displays and highlights
your statement labels and variable names where you have placed them in
your code. It is a powerful tool for the advanced assembly language
programmer yet friendly enough for someone just starting with assembly
language.
41.2 AVAILABILITY
The ZD86 Debugger is available from:
ftp://cet.cet.com/pub/80xxx/zd86-101.zip
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 22 Jun 97
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
Subject: 42. Links to x86 Processor Manufacturers
AMD
http://www.amd.com/K6/k6docs/index.html
Intel
http://developer.intel.com/design/PentiumII/manuals/
Cyrix
http://www.cyrix.com/developers/dv-home.htm
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 25 Oct 98
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
43.1 Microsoft's 16-bit linker
Microsoft has its 16-bit DOS linker available from its FTP site. The
linkers URL is:
ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/softlib/mslfiles/lnk563.exe
43.2 ALINK
ALINK is a linker that I am writing, to link object files into
executable programs. The ultimate purpose is to write a free and
portable linker to go with NASM, which can link all the NASM output
formats into any one of a number of possible executable formats, so
that the pair provide a portable assembler and linker for Intel CPUs
on any OS. Thus ALINK is written in ANSI C, in order to be fully
portable.
At the moment, ALINK can only link OBJ (Microsoft/Intel OMF) and LIB
format files (as generated by Borland's compilers, and NASM and DOS
versions of Microsoft compilers) into MS-DOS COM files, and MS-DOS EXE
files, and (PE)Win32 EXE and DLL files. 32-bit records are supported.
The aim is to support generation of Win16 program files (New
Executable), OS/2 Linear Executable files, a.out executables, ELF
executables, and raw binary files.
Also available is IMPLIB, a Win32 import library generator, as a
companion to ALINK.
These are available form Anthony's Programming Page:
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Network/4311/index.html
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 25 Oct 98
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
Subject: 44. ASM Mailing Lists NEW
44.1 NASM MAILING LIST
Michael Darling has started a NASM mailing list. You can subscribe to
the list on the following web page:
http://nasm.home.ml.org
44.2 X86 ASM MAILING LIST
Michael Ware has created an x86 ASM mailing list. You can subscribe
to the list on the following web page:
http::www.eGroups.com/list/assembly
Contributor: Ray Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com
Last Changed: 23 Nov 98
Return to the Table Of Contents-----------------------------
I would like to acknowledge all the people who have assisted me or any of the contributors. For their time and effort, this FAQ is a better product. David Boedicker, Barry Brey, Paolo Ciccone, Giuseppe De Marco, Morten Elling, Kris Heidenstrom, Alan Illeman, Don Krull, Chabad Lubavitch, Thanh Ma, Jeff Owens, Ed Parry, Keith Petersen, Michael Roberts, Russell Schulz, Rocky Seelbach, Janos Szamosfalvi and Cedric Ware Return to the Table Of Contents