From: Ullrich von Bassewitz (uz_at_musoftware.de)
Date: 2002-12-26 20:16:47
On Thu, Dec 26, 2002 at 04:43:41PM +0100, TXG/MNX wrote:
> Would it be possible to write and OS like Lunix or some other OS like
> that completely in CC65?
>
> This would make coding for different platforms like c64, atari, apple II
> and other 6502 systems more interested.
Using C instead of assembly is always a tradeoff: It will add some overhead to
your programs, but at the same time, development is a lot faster. Because an
operating system, especially one that does multitasking, is already at the
limits of the machine, chances are high that the additional overhead will make
it too large/slow. A second reason was already given by MagerValp: It is not
possible to write interrupt code or task switching code in C (this is true for
any C compiler - all operating systems I know have at least a small percentage
of assembler functions).
C support for an operating system would be useful in the higher layers of the
OS, or in the application layer. The nice thing about C is that it saves a lot
of development time, so you can do more in the same time. Even if you rewrite
parts of it in assembler later, there may still be time savings, because the
assembly code is just a conversion of the working C code, and all algorithms
are already tested.
Regards
Uz
--
Ullrich von Bassewitz uz_at_musoftware.de
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