Symbol Engine

I know some people still like the feeling of the original C64 keyboard when they code assembly but memory problems and frequent crashes while directly accessing resources on a real C= give coders who dont own a ram expansion or a cartridge one hell of a headache. Cross development on a PC is a nice alternative. Here is my Cross development toolbox:

Relaunch64 IDE
This IDE is strictly for C64 assembly crossdevelopment and has very nice features. It has syntax highlighting and can easily be configured to use a number of CrossAssemblers, Crunchers and Emulators. The editor has some weird bugs, but if you dont want to configure giant editors like EMACS to do what you want, then this is what you want.

Exomizer Cross Cruncher
You know those loading times on C= machines can drive anyone mad. A cruncher compresses your executable code and adds a decompressor at the beggining of the file. But crunching involves heavy calculations that is better done on a fast machine if you are fond of your sanity. Exomizer 2 is a cross-cruncher. It is full 32-bit code that works on intel machines, and it can crunch executable files for VIC20, C64, C16/plus4, C128, Atari 400/800 XL/XE, Apple ][+ and //e. Nice eh?

VICE Emulator
And of course you wouldn't want to transfer binaries from PC to your C= too often. This is a multiplatform emulator that is *almost* as good as the real box. Still you would want to check your final binaries on a real C=. Just in case…
The current version emulates the C64, the C128, the VIC20, all the PET models (except the SuperPET 9000, which is out of line anyway), the PLUS4 and the CBM-II (aka C610).

So don't frikking sit there, Go 8-bit!

Popularity: 25% [?]