Other assembly challenges

[rp.wavv]

I greatly enjoyed this chapter, and it has proven to be incredibly helpful for building the CPU. Has anyone tried doing any other challenges using this assembly? I’ve considered some other basic calculations but would love to do more with the screen and keyboard. But is this pretty limited given the small number of instructions? I know more complex programs will result but as a result of higher level language work and OS development. Just wondering how one can go about assessing what might be possible with assembly, or is that just it, gotta try some stuff and see for myself?

[pm100]

whatever you can do with higher level languages can be done with assembler, its just more thinking and typing

[WBahn]

rp.wavv wrote

But is this pretty limited given the small number of instructions? I know more complex programs will result but as a result of higher level language work and OS development.

It's actually the other way around -- you can do quite a bit more with an assembly-language program than you will be able to do with a program written in a higher-level language because those programs come with the inevitable overhead. That's the tradeoff for being able to work at a higher level of abstraction than assembly, which makes it easier to develop and debug your programs.

[rp.wavv]

pm100 wrote

its just more thinking and typing

That’s becoming more and more clear

[rp.wavv]

WBahn wrote

It's actually the other way around -- you can do quite a bit more with an assembly-language program than you will be able to do with a program written in a higher-level language because those programs come with the inevitable overhead. That's the tradeoff for being able to work at a higher level of abstraction than assembly, which makes it easier to develop and debug your programs.

I totally get it’s quicker the closer you are to the hardware and more efficient—Just hard for my brain to wrap around when I’m writing so many lines of assembly to multiple variables that would be a single line in something like Python (though I can only imagine how much is happening behind the scenes to do that!).

I appreciate the response and I am slowly realizing this lol!