Per this post, it could be very convenient to have a standard routine, say in ROM, that folks can call in their program that will report the available amount of RAM on the system. This avoids folks having to program this into their own programs and provides a standard method for reporting the RAM usage. Many types of programs could use this feature. In the case of the linked post, it was for a text edit / word processor; but games, trackers, really many apps that are using banked RAM.
The perk of the routine in ROM is it only has to be used if needed; but another thought was to have the system scan the available RAM at boot and report this as a variable within the BASIC RAM area. Then programs, upon startup, can look at this address and know the amount. And it could be a fun start-up sequence that is much like older PC BIOS startups, in a small twist of irony given the X16 is a VIC-20 spiritual successor
One or both methods would allow programs to have less duplication and more standardization. Certainly a nice to have, but not a need to have though would certainly add creature comforts, particularly given how much ROM space is available.
Per this post, it could be very convenient to have a standard routine, say in ROM, that folks can call in their program that will report the available amount of RAM on the system. This avoids folks having to program this into their own programs and provides a standard method for reporting the RAM usage. Many types of programs could use this feature. In the case of the linked post, it was for a text edit / word processor; but games, trackers, really many apps that are using banked RAM.
The perk of the routine in ROM is it only has to be used if needed; but another thought was to have the system scan the available RAM at boot and report this as a variable within the BASIC RAM area. Then programs, upon startup, can look at this address and know the amount. And it could be a fun start-up sequence that is much like older PC BIOS startups, in a small twist of irony given the X16 is a VIC-20 spiritual successor
One or both methods would allow programs to have less duplication and more standardization. Certainly a nice to have, but not a need to have though would certainly add creature comforts, particularly given how much ROM space is available.
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