#26070 - getch - Mon Sep 06, 2004 8:32 pm
Hi.
Just discovered this forum today.
I've been coding c/c++ in dos for a few years now, but never knew there was such a community for gba programming.
Anyway, I've downloaded plenty of FAQ's, so I'll get to reading them and try something myself.
Expect plenty of annoying questions from me.
:)
#26074 - DiscoStew - Mon Sep 06, 2004 9:47 pm
Unlike most c/c++ programming where you deal with libraries that interface with hardware (mainly talking about Windows and of the like), you'll have direct access to the hardware through the memory-mapped registers. It may take some getting used to, but as long as you know the concepts and how the memory-mapped registers work with the GBA, you shouldn't have any problems.
On this forum....You got questions? We've got answers. First thing however before asking any question is to check the Beginner's section and search the forums for anything similar to your question. Can't find one? Then ask away. All of us are here to help each other out.
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#26075 - ampz - Mon Sep 06, 2004 10:19 pm
He is a DOS programmer.. He knows the drill.. :-)
I recommend reading one or two of the GBA tutorials out there.
"The PERN project" helped me alot in the begining.
#26079 - DiscoStew - Tue Sep 07, 2004 2:25 am
I've never programmed in actual DOS before, though I should have though as much that he knew this concept of GBA programming.
And yes, The Pern Project is a very good place to start from. Dovoto, the maintainer of that site, is currently redoing many of his tutorials, though he has kept his old tutorials available. I really do hope he gets his hands dirty in his multiplayer tutorial, as many here have a lot of trouble starting off.
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#26198 - getch - Thu Sep 09, 2004 1:53 pm
OK, I've read some tutorials and decided that PERN was the most basic, so I've started with that.
Ive got two problems so far.
Ive gotten to the first demo, which just fills the display with red pixels.
I'm using the devkitadv for compiling, and had to change some filenames which were being called different names in the batch file.
The files in the archive were arm-agb-elf-objcopy.exe and arm-agb-elf-gcc.exe, but the batch file called arm-elf-objcopy.exe and arm-elf-gcc.exe.
I couldnt find these files, so I just renamed the ones I had, and the compiler seemed to accept them. (although this might have caused the next problem)
-specs=gba_mb.specs
The tutorial says that this line in the batch file is for making multiboot compatible, but when I run the batch file it looks for the file gba_mb.specs which doesn't exist.
How can I fix this?
One last thing:
Since I couldn't compile this demo, I ran the .gba file in Visualboy Advance.
I have the newest version but it crashes, giving an error about an unsupported bios call, and that a bios file was needed. After searching online I found out that it is illegal to distribute the gba bios, but is there an alternative? Something user-created maybe?
Any help is appretiated, I'd like to get started writing code as soon as I can fix these other probelms.
#26202 - FluBBa - Thu Sep 09, 2004 3:50 pm
Dump your own bios.
If you don't have a flashcart you can probably find the bios online, if you don't have a GBA yet I didn't say that.
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#26205 - abilyk - Thu Sep 09, 2004 5:20 pm
getch: It sounds like you're reading the new version of the Pern tutorial, which uses DevkitARM and not DevKitAdv. DevKitAdv doesn't use the -specs flag but DevkitARM does. Most people would suggest switching to DevkitARM, but if you'd rather not, you'll need to reference the old version of the tutorial which covers DevKitAdv.
#26208 - getch - Thu Sep 09, 2004 5:40 pm
| abilyk wrote: |
| Most people would suggest switching to DevkitARM. |
I though that just handled assembly?
I just downloaded it but before I try it out, how is it different thatn Devkitadv?
#26242 - tepples - Fri Sep 10, 2004 1:34 am
devkitARM includes GCC compiled for C and C++ but not Fortran or Objective-C, of a more recent GCC version than DevKit Advance (3.4.something vs. 3.2.3). The link scripts that come with devkitARM are simpler (less conditional bullcrap). However, it needs a 'specs' file to pick a link script because it's designed to work out of the box with GP32, GBA, and a couple other platforms. It comes with several specs files, which you can select on the command line when linking.
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