What's new in emulators?

[Les Wright]

I have a dirty little secret to share.

I know this forum exists to celebrate HP calculators, the real thing.

I own a HP48G and HP41CV, but in recent weeks use them little. The reason? I am addicted to emulators.

Indeed, the main reason I recently splurged on a Palm TX was so the 320x480 screen could more reasonably present Free42, Power48, and P41CX, since the 320x320 screen on my little Clie was just too small.

I am delighted with Free42, which Thomas Okken continually improves, and Power48, to which Robert Hildinger has returned recently and which hopefully will be updated in the near future. I also really like Emu48 as an RPL programming environment.

But I am pining for the perfect 41C/CV/CX emulator. The currently available options have a lot of what I want but not all in one package.

Warren Furlow's V41 is beautiful to look at an has a full range of modules and user programs included, but doesn't support printing. Mr. Furlow recently advised me that he has no further plans for V41.

Ron van Tilburg's VB41 has more accessible program memory and really neat printer emulation, but the interface is a little less attractive (though functional) and if there is a way to import user code in, say, raw format, I haven't figured it out. Moreover, it looks like there has been no further developement of this one since 2002.

Hrast's HP41X for HP48/49 is amazing, but a little pricey for a recreational user and also requires that one keep track of the keyboard mapping. His HP41E precursors are no longer supported, but I do like how the PC version includes a virtual printer.

For Palm, Charles Lee's P41CX is the only act in town. The bitmaps for the 320x480 display are very nice, and I like how he allows adjustment for CPU speed and battery use. However, the means of importing user code, the P41CXKC compiler, is a bit cumbersome when one considers that Free42 allows the hassle free importation of raw format files. Also, the printer emulation to the memo application has a bug or two. That said, I like how he has made most, if not all, of the main Application Pac ROMs available via the P41CXRM application. I have no idea if updates or bug fixes are planned here.

After this lengthy preamble, my question to the forum is this: Anyone out there working on refining any of the above, at least in those cases where the source code is available? I particularly would vote for a refinement of V41 to allow printing and to include more intrinsic program memory, and a reworking of P41CX to improve printer emulation and make it easier to import code.

I am a relative newcomer to all this, so if these issues have been debated before my arrival please forgive me. But if I have offered fresh food for thought I would like to learn what people have to say.

Les

[Eric Smith]

Quote:

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For Palm, Charles Lee's P41CX is the only act in town.

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That's P41CX by Charles Lee and Eric Smith.

Eventually this will be replaced by a Palm version of Nonpareil. I'm working on binary file import.

[Les Wright]

I stand deservedly corrected. You are acknowledged in the license document, albeit not as prominently as I am sure you deserve.

I really look forward to benefitting from your present work.

Many thanks,

Les Wright

[Namir]

Les,

Eric's work is amazing! He has won the best speaker award in the HHC2004 and HHC2005 conferences for his work on emulators.

Namir

[Les Wright]

Agreed! The HP41CV implementation under Nonpareil for windows looks and behaves beautifully, despite that pesky bug the requires one to delete the 41CV.nst file every time you add the printer module. I still miss the ability to import user programs, and I am trying to figure out how, if at all possible, to convert the the various ROMs included with V41 so that Nonpareil can recognize them. The interface is very crisp and attractive.

I really look forward to a PalmOS version for this. Heck, I may ditch my new Palm TX and upgrade to a Life Drive!

Les

[Eric Smith]

Right now the Nonpareil code only supports hard-addressed modules. If you change the header of a .mod file of a ROM to give it a fixed address, you'll be able to use it in Nonpareil.

This is one of the things that will be improved in the version under development. In the short term, it won't be as fancy as the automatic addressing in V41; you'll be asked which port you want to install the module into.

Since the various other Nonpareil work I'm doing isn't ready yet, and many people have asked about ROM modules, I'll try to put together a version with the improved module support. Part of that will be getting it to remember which modules are installed, which will fix the printer problem.

Eric

[Les Wright]

Quote:

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Right now the Nonpareil code only supports hard-addressed modules. If you change the header of a .mod file of a ROM to give it a fixed address, you'll be able to use it in Nonpareil.

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Is it an easy enough matter to do this? I have opened both your 82143a.mod file and the V41 finance.mod file in a text reader, and the readable stuff at the beginning, before the binary symbolic stuff, looks remarkably similar in form and content.

Les

[Ron van Tilburg]

Les,

I do have a more recent version of VB41Cx (version 3.2) which fixes some locale issues and works properly under XP. I just need a home for it. I havent uploaded to Warrens site yet.

Also, it is possible to upload raw etc files. I explain this in some part in the manual...

these are the Card reader extensions
RDRAWP Read Raw Program ie Program off disk in .raw format
RDRAWS Read Raw SubRoutine Program ie Program off disk in .raw format
WRRAWP Write program (named in alpha) as .raw file

cheers Ron van Tilburg - BTW thanks for the mention.

[Les Wright]

Thanks for the direction! I was not aware of the actions of those various card reader emulation routines (I never used a card reader in the real calculator before), but, sure enough, they are well documented in the manual.

Les has another RTFM moment!

I look forward to the wide release of v. 3.2.

Les

[David Smith]

I have not used any of the 41C type emulators in quite some time. Do any of them have the ability to load a program from an ASCII file of keystroke or function names? I would like to spiff up the user interface on some programs that I wrote a while back, but don't want to do it using the limited editing available on the calculator.

[Les Wright]

I have okay success with this.

The Windows interface via this makes things a little easier. I find that decompiling from RAW to TXT format seems to work a lot more readily than going the other way since the compiler can be fussy--what compiler isn't? There are some quirky means of rendering special characters (like ALPHA append, and the various conditional tests) that need to be learned.

Les