Question about BLASM.

[mewatC]

Hello,

what exactly is BLASM, is it comparable with TASM, NASM or MASM but for
Windows?
http://www.andreasberg.se\blasm.php

I want to start with Assembly programming and i heard that the syntax or
code is different for each assembler-version. Where could a newby learn the
syntax of BLASM, or should a beginner use one of the above Versions first?

Can anyone recommend me a detailed tutorial for TASM, please?

Thank you!

greetings,
NewatC

[Kennedy]

blasm appears to be an assembler with an IDE. . . There's not much about it other than it has the IDE. . . as far as how does it compare with the others - I don't think an assembler is that complicated, therefore, if it does a 1:1 map of your code, it is just as good as the others.

The syntax and/or instruction set is different for each platform. For example, you could not write an Assembly program for both the x86 and for the Strong Arm. Also, there are a couple of different coding styles, for example AT&T vs. Intel syntax. A document on this can be found here. But, be warned, Assembly language is EXTREMELY precise. You do not have control statements like for(; and while(). All of that is generally taken care of for you by the language itself, however, in Assembly _YOU_ have the responsibility to do EACH step.

A good book (one that I have and is my crutch when I am force to write stupid boot loaders -- catch the common theme here lately ) is IBM PC Assembly Language and Programming by Peter Able, mine is the Third Edition. One might say this book is out-of-date, however, the x86 platform appears to be here to stay for a while. Even with ia64 there is still the same instruction set as before.

If you are unaware, BTW, an instruction set is not what is in the language, however, is what the machine knows. For example, a jmp instruction on the i386 is 0xE8 and causes the IP to be set to the offset address listed. jmp on a different platform (Mac, Arm, RISC, etc) would probably not be the same machine code.

I hope I have assisted you in your quest. I'd suggest also to get some type of formal training in this subject matter.

Good luck.

[mewatC]

Hello,

thank you for your answer!

But, be warned, Assembly language is EXTREMELY precise. You do not have control statements like for(; and while(). All of that is generally taken care of for you by the language itself, however, in Assembly _YOU_ have the responsibility to do EACH step.

Yes, that is the reason why i am so interested in assembler, and because it's so
close to the hardware.

greetings,
newatC

[manutd]

Yes, assembly is hard to do, particularly anything useful. Kennedy would know

[swgh]

It's about as low level as it gets, unless you know how to code in binary that is

[manutd]

I've done that once. Nothing very functional, but it was funny