ChibiAkumas ASM Programming Forum

Hi,

My name is Martijn from the Netherlands and my programming skills are subzero, so I want to learn that.
I choose the ZX Spectrum because of mainly I want to know the base of early home computers hitting the homes in early '80s.
My father owned a ZX Spectrum early '80s, and he did programming on that very good, but I was too young to appreciate it, and besides that I did not live with him nor did I see my father very much to learn from him at all.

Late 80's I personally owned a MSX 1 and later a MSX 2 I aspired to write beautifull games and demo's like I saw at friends' homes on their C64/Amiga computers.
That did not work out the way I intended to, unfortunatly, so I got stuck very quickly and gave that dream up.
One of the problems I encountered back then, was a lack of knowledge and interest in putting time and effort in.
Also my mind was (and is) not too quick in understanding logical actions and formulas either in math or in programming.

In short: I also choose the ZX Spectrum because of the self build home kit of ByteDelight.com, and ordered the Harlequin 128 rev 2.
Also I bought a load of 2nd (or 3rd, or 4th....) hand basic and machine-code books for the ZX Spectrum.
This Harlequin has to arrive yet, so I'm busy with different emulators right now, practicing basic and assembly.

Back in the 80's when I myself owned a MSX 1, I understood the program-listing when it's explained or when I debug and watch registers change.
BUT creating it on my own is a whole other chapter, of which the book has been closed for many years.

So mainly I want to also develop a logical way of thinking, I'm doing a math course for some months now, which I enjoy.
And learning a right way of programming and understanding how I'm able to let the machine work for me is something I wanted all my life.
So a fresh new start for that matter.

The Chibi course I started with a few days ago, is going fast, a little it too fast for me personally.
But I hang on and type the listings in and read and debug and so.

Hopefully, I can learn from this course enough and ask a few beginner questions from now and then?

Greetings,
Martijn.

Hi Martijn,
Nice to see someone else who is starting from scratch and learning something entirely new to them.
I do have some previous experience in web coding languages, so that sometimes helps me.
Although, learning z80 ASM is quite the different language compared with PHP and MySQL.

I look forward to reading about your progress and I'll lend a hand if I can. I doubt I'll be much use as i'm still learning the basics myself. Happy to try if I can.

A piece of advice. as you are writing your programs, put notes next to them so you remember what it does when you haven't looked at it for a while. I made that mistake a while ago and had to go over all of my code, commenting the lot to remember what it did.
i.e.

Hello Martijn! Glad to see a fellow MSX fan onboard. My mom actually owned an MSX1 as a kid herself.

Weirdly, I came here primarily for the MSX.