Though not Halt and Catch Fire you guys are forgetting the joy of self modifying code.

That is how many PDP-8 programs worked.  Even the bin loader where the jump to loop instruction would be replaced with a jump to loaded program start by the loader itself.

There were many programs that were very difficult to figure out what they were doing, due to using this technique.

I love the PDP-8 but I don't miss self modifying code at all.


On 11/3/2024 4:03 PM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote:

On Nov 3, 2024, at 4:59 PM, Mychaela Falconia <fal...@freecalypso.org> wrote:

Paul Koning wrote:

1. Show a one-word PDP-11 program that writes all of memory, in reverse order.
MOV -(PC),-(PC)

I remember this one from late-Soviet/early-Russian BK0010 hacker clubs...
BK0010 was a "home computer" built around 1801VM1 microprocessor, a
Soviet implementation of basic PDP-11 instruction set.  No idea exactly
which DEC model it corresponds to, if any.

2. Show a one-word PDP-11 program that clears all of memory,
in forward order, halting on completion.
This one I am struggling with - it's been too many decades since I did
any PDP-11 assembly...
Hint: you get to pick the initial values of the registers.

        paul


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