FPGA VAX update

---snip--- interesting to roll your own computer using an off-the-shelf processor (or multiples). I have a simple 8088-based SBC design wired up and waiting for motivation to put together some test firmware. The main thing that has kept me development tools going. I'm used to little 4 and 8-bit assemblers where you can plop down a few ORG statements and have it all resident in a ROM, and almost all the x86 asm tools start from the assumption you are running on DOS and have no direct control of the memory map. Hi Of course you could learn Forth and use a program called TCOM that runs under FPC. Both are in the public domain. While FPC is specifically to run on a PC, TCOM can be used to target most any processor and memory arrangement. TCOM was originally written to create small *.COM files from Forth source but it became quickly obvious that one could us it as a basic target compiler. There are several examples of doing just that that are also available. I've used it to create both assembly and Forth code for Z80's and 186/188's. I mostly use it to bring up a Forth interpreter on some other machine but it could be used to create most any application as well. To do much useful work at using it as a target compiler/assembler, one does need to have a good understanding of Forth in general and some inside familiarity with FPC as well. For many of the more familiar processors, someone has already written an assembler that runs under TCOM. Since these are just Forth based assemblers, it doesn't take much to create an assembler for some specific processor, as long as one knows the machine code for it. Dwight