#5 Example Linker Script

[Lily Hughes-Robinson]

Hello!

I have been really enjoying the VirtualT emulator. I downloaded the emulator to get more familair with 8085 assembly for the model "T." I was able to successfully assemble a file, but the IDE gave me an error asking for a linker script. I looked in the documentation and online and wasn't able to find an example linker script. Can you please provide a basic linker script for me to use as a template with the assembler/IDE?

Best,
Dave

[Mark Lougheed]

Here's the short answer. More detail in a later post.
1. In your project folder, create file with a .lkr extension (e.g. link.lkr) and set it in the linker script folder in the project tree.
2. In your .lkr file add a single line to indicate the start and end of the absolute code segment (assumes you have and ASEG psuedo-op before the ORG of your assembler file.

CODE NAME=.aseg START=0xe380 END=0xf380

This particular command sets up the code to locate in a 4k area just below the PC-8201 bookeeping area. So reserve in BASIC with:

CLEAR 256,58240

Be sure to save your .lkr file so it's updated in the project, and make sure your ORG is set within the area reserved by the CLEAR command and within the START and END of your code segment.

Assuming there are no other assembly errors, the assembler should then be able to create files of the types chosen in the Project->Settings dialog box.

MDL

[Mark Lougheed]

Here's an example project for PC-8201. Your "mileage may vary" depending on the other models supported by the Virtual-T emulator.

This particular example is a code stub used to transfer data between RAM banks using the PC-8201 ROM routines. It's meant to be used with BASIC EXEC statement after POKE-ing the various target variables into memory.