Computation structures

Is it normal that the maze is partially drawn or not drawn at all while my program ends normally ?

It might not be caused by a bug in your code: there is a bug in the simulator which does not refresh the memory view when it stops on a HALT() instruction. You have several solutions to check the final maze:

• Refresh the memory view by minimizing then maximizing the window.
• Make sure the simulator doesn't stop on the HALT() instruction by adding a breakpoint on a NO-OP like in this main.asm file

βSim is a simulator for the β-assembly language written in Java. It features:

• An assembler to generate machine code.
• A debugger featuring instruction per instruction execution, registers, stack and memory visualization.
• A minimal code editor with error highlighting (when the code is assembled).

The simulator comes as a .jar package you can run in several ways:

• On modern systems with UI (Windows,...), you can simply double-click on the file.
• If you prefer using a console, you can run: java -jar bsim-vram.jar [file1 file2 ...].

Because the built-in code editor is minimal, I don't recommend using it for developing programs. For instance, there is no "Undo" nor "Redo" option, so you might lose some work by performing some non-deliberate deletions. It is better to first write your code in another text editor such as NotePad++ or Sublime Text (β-assembly syntax highlighting and snippets, check this forum for installation location), and then load it into the simulator for testing.

Loading and launching code

To execute some code you have written in the simulator, you first have to load this piece of code in the editor. This can be done by clicking on in the upper toolbar and walking through your filesystem for getting the .asm file.

When your code is ready to be executed, the execution can be triggered by clicking on in the upper toolbar. If your code does not contain any syntax error, you will be redirected to the execution window. Otherwise, the syntax error will be described in the bottom of the editor window.

Breakpoints

You can indicate to the β-machine you want to pause the execution of your code at a specific instruction by writing the keyword .breakpoint:

main:
    |; Do something
    LD(R1, 0, R5)
    .breakpoint         |; The machine will pause its execution at this step
    ADDC(R5, R2, R6)
    |; ...