Prog8 documentation - 14.0-BETA2

Prog8 is a compiled programming language targeting the 8-bit 6502 CPU family, as well as the 32-bit Motorola 68000 CPU. It aims to provide many conveniences over raw assembly code (even when using a macro assembler), while still being low level enough to create high performance programs.

Supported target systems are Commodores (C64, C128, PET), Commander X16, the Commodore Amiga (32-bit m68k, via the amiga500 and amiga1200 targets), the Qemu M68k simulator (qemu68k), and others.

Get the compiler here Getting the software.

Open source Software License

Full source code is on github: https://github.com/irmen/prog8.git Prog8 is copyright © Irmen de Jong (irmen@razorvine.net | http://www.razorvine.net).

This is free software, as defined in the GNU GPL 3.0 (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html) Exception: All output files generated by the compiler (intermediary files and compiled binary programs) are excluded from this particular license: you can do with those whatever you want. This means, for instance, that you can use the Prog8 compiler to create commercial software as long as you only sell the actual resulting program.

Contents of this manual:

• What is Prog8?
  • Community
  • Want to buy me a coffee or a pizza perhaps?
  • Language Features
  • Getting the software
  • AI Assisted Development
• Prog8 versus other languages
  • The language
  • No linker
  • Data types
  • Variables
  • Subroutines
  • Pointers and Structs
  • Foreign function interface (external/ROM calls)
  • Optimizations
• Compiling a program
  • First, getting a working compiler
  • Required additional tools
  • Running the compiler
  • Module source code files
  • Debugging (with VICE or Box16)
  • Troubleshooting
  • Examples
• Programming in Prog8
  • Elements of a program
  • Variables
  • Identifiers
  • Blocks, Scopes, and accessing Symbols
  • Program Start and Entry Point
  • Directives
  • Loops
  • Conditional Execution
  • Unconditional jump: goto
  • Assignments
  • Expressions
  • swap statement
  • Operators
  • Subroutines
  • Library routines and builtin functions
• Variables and Values
  • Variables
  • Constants
  • Enums
  • Data Types
• Structs and Pointers
  • Untyped pointers and the pointer type
  • Typed pointer to simple datatype
  • Dereferencing a pointer, pointer arithmetic
  • Structs
  • Arrays of struct instances
  • Unions
  • Address-Of: untyped vs typed
  • Accessing struct definitions in Assembly code
• Binary Loadable Libraries
  • Requirements
  • %output library
  • Library initialization
  • Jump table
  • Loading and using the library
  • Example library code
• Library modules and builtin functions
  • Built-in Functions
  • Low-fi variable and subroutine definitions in all available library modules
  • Library modules
• Target system specification
  • Customizable targets
  • Memory Model
  • CPU
  • IRQ Handling (general)
  • Commander X16 specific IRQ handling
• Technical details
  • Variable storage
  • ROM/RAM bank selection
  • Symbol prefixing in generated Assembly code
  • Subroutine Calling Conventions
  • Compiler Internals
  • ROM-able programs
  • Formal ANTLR4 syntax and grammar definition
• Performance profiling
  • Run-time memory profiling with the X16 emulator
  • Subroutine call profiling with the X16 emulator
• Porting Guide
  • CPU
  • Memory Map
  • Character encodings
  • ROM routines
  • Support libraries
• Software written in Prog8
• TODO
  • Future Things and Ideas
  • Won’t do’s or deferred
  • Romable (%option romable)
  • IR/VM
  • Libraries
  • Optimizations
  • Dead Code Elimination bug in 64tass, for nested subroutines
• Prog8 Compiler Release History
  • Summary of Major Language Milestones
  • Breaking Changes Summary
  • 2019–2022 — Early Development (Python to Kotlin Transition)
  • 2023 — Language Maturation
  • 2024 — Advanced Features
  • 2024–2026 — Modern Prog8
• Index