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diff --git a/README.baremetal.md b/README.baremetal.md new file mode 100644 index 00000000..5cdb75ed --- /dev/null +++ b/README.baremetal.md @@ -0,0 +1,45 @@ +Some apps written in SubX and Mu. Where the rest of this repo relies on a few +Linux syscalls, the apps in this subdirectory interface directly with hardware. +We still need the top-level and apps to build them. + +I'd like to eventually test these programs on real hardware, and to that end +they are extremely parsimonious in the hardware they assume: + + 0. Lots (more than 640KB/1MB[1]) of RAM + 1. Pure-graphics video mode (1024x768 pixels) in 256-color mode. At 8x8 + pixels per grapheme, this will give us 160x128 graphemes. But it's still + an open question if it's reasonably widely supported by modern hardware. + If it isn't, I'll downsize. + 2. Keyboard. Just a partial US keyboard for now. Main qwerty zone only. No + number pad, no function keys, no ctrl/alt/meta/fn/super/capslck/numlck. + +That's it: + * No wifi, no networking + * No multitouch, no touchscreen, no mouse + * No graphics acceleration + * No virtual memory, no memory reclamation + +Just your processor, gigabytes of RAM[1], a moderately-sized monitor and a +keyboard. (The mouse should also be easy to provide.) + +We can't yet read from or write to disk, except for the initial load of the +program. Enabling access to lots of RAM gives up access to BIOS helpers for +the disk. + +These programs don't convert to formats like ELF that can load on other +operating systems. There's also currently no code/data segment separation, +just labels and bytes. I promise not to write self-modifying code. Security +and sandboxing is still an open question. + +Programs start executing at address 0x9400. See baremetal/boot.hex for +details. + +Mu programs always run all their automated tests first. `main` only runs if +there are no failing tests. See baremetal/mu-init.subx for details. + +So far the programs have only been tested in Qemu and Bochs emulators. + +[1] Though we might need to start thinking of [the PC memory map](https://wiki.osdev.org/Memory_Map_(x86)) +as our programs grow past the first 32MB of memory. Mu doesn't yet make any +attempt to understand how much RAM the underlying computer has. Also, writing +to random locations can damage hardware or corrupt storage devices. |