The web based IDE includes an emulator, editor, and assembler so you can develop Kwak-8 programs without having to download anything.
while the assembler is broadly similar to existing AVR assemblers it is not intended to be totally compatible. It includes a number of features designed to assist people coding directly in assembler. It is a straight-to-binary assembler and does not use a linker.
The most notable enhancements to the assembler are snips and assemble-time functions. Snips allow code to be added to a program conditionally and work well in conjunction to macros.
.snip WaitForFrame
vwait_:
push r0
push r1
in r1,port_FrameTick
.lp:
in r0,port_FrameTick
cp r0,r1
breq .lp
pop r1
pop r0
ret
.endsnip
In the snip above. The code implements a loop checking to see if the frame counter has changed.
When declared as a snip, the code is not immediately generated in the program but will
be appended to the program if a .use WaitForFrame directive occurs in the code.
Multiple instances of .use can exist and the code will be included only once.
This make it possible to write macros that can automatically bring in supporting code.
.macro vwait
.use WaitForFrame
call vwait_
.endmacro
In the case where a macro contains the .use directive, using the macro is enough
to include any supporting code. If the macro is never used
the support code is also not included in the program.
While the assembled instructions themselves are limited to using simple operations on fairly small integers, you can have more complexity when it comes to how instruction parameters are calculated.
The Assembler uses mathjs to provide constant expression evaluation. This allows a variety of interesting features
ldi r16, 3*5+1 // assembles as ldi r16,16;
numberOfSheep = 28
double(x) = 2x
ldi r17, double(numberOfSheep) // assembles as ldi r17,56
You can also perform mathjs expressions in conditional assembly .if conditions
.macro min reg,val
.if isRegister(val)
cp reg,val
brlo .done
mov reg,val
.else
cpi reg,val
brlo .done
ldi reg,val
.endif
.done:
.endmacro
min r16,8 //generates cpi r16,8 | brlo ... | ldi r16,8
min r16,r15 //generates cp r16,r15 | brlo ... | mov r16,r16