Recreating the Compukit UK101 (5)
Software rules the world. Without software computers are just pieces of plastic, sand, and rusting metal. So as well as writing some original software for the UK101 I’ve also experimented with using some contemporary software. So far, everything I’ve tried has worked as expected. This is little to do with me, but is very much a testament to Grant Searle (and others) for the work undertaken in creating the original FPGA implementation and its components, along with the original authors of the UK101 monitors and BASIC ROMS.
I’ve already mentioned in an earlier post that the first piece of software I used on the machine was a prime number generator. I originally wrote the code for the RC2014 and have subsequently ported it to other machines. Aside from a couple of instructions to control the number of lines displayed on the screen, the RC2014 code (unsurprisingly) works unaltered.
A program published in a 1980 edition of Practical Electronics – Le Passe Temps – was next. It’s a very compact piece of code (it fits in the 4K minimal implementation of this project) that delivers an addictive version of Connect 4. I’ve spent far too long playing it already.
Inevitably for the era in which the UK101 was sold there are a couple of space invaders clones available. There’s a brief discussion about one of these and the keyboard layout changes I implemented to make the game more comfortable to play in the 4th article of this series.
I wasn’t able to find a version of Conway’s Life – so I wrote my own as a way of getting used to the 64×32 layout in the final design. It’s the least sophisticated algorithm possible as it checks every single cell in each generation, so is rather pedestrian with a 1MHz 6502, but is much better at 16.6MHz of course.
The last bit of software I decided to try to get working was Computing Today’s “The Valley”. In 1982 it was a mammoth type-in exercise that I did on a Sharp MZ-80K … and it’s still a mammoth type-in exercise today! Needless to say it didn’t get finished, but fortunately (?) RetroChallenge 2022/10 has now been announced, so no prizes for guessing what I’ve entered 😀.