Freder

Over the past few months I've been running the idea of turning the 2600 into a computer through my head. It came to me after finding my BASIC programming cart and wondering how it could be improved upon.

The first changes I thought about were implementing an ascii keyboard into port 0 via UART and using output to port 1 as a way of loading/saving programs to tape. A computer without a way to load and save programs is pretty much just a calculator.

I also thought about trying to write a simple BASIC interpreter for the machine but after considering the memory limitations of the 6507 and the 2600 itself I had worked out on paper a keyword oriented BASIC dialect that seemed to be a cross between "BASIC programming" and the Zx80. The language itself took up 8k, not including the routines to communicate with the keyboard, so I figured a simpler approach was needed.

I decided to scrap the BASIC idea and go for a machine code monitor with a 24 key hex keypad. The monitor I'm working on is just under 2k and I figure a hex keypad would be easier to implement hardware wise. My biggest problem at the moment is that it is a machine code monitor and would probably be more for novelty value or for the most hard core programmers : P

Any thoughts?