From: raymoon@dgsys.com (Raymond Moon) Newsgroups: alt.lang.asm,comp.lang.asm.x86,news.answers,alt.answers,comp.answers Subject: x86 Assembly Language FAQ - General Part 1/3 Supersedes: <5h6dvs$b4q@reader1.news.act.net> Followup-To: alt.lang.asm,comp.lang.asm.x86 Date: 21 Apr 1997 21:20:34 GMT Organization: MoonWare Lines: 804 Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.EDU Distribution: world Expires: Tue, 20 May 1997 23:59:59 GMT Message-ID: <5jgln2$ijs@news.dgsys.com> Reply-To: raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Summary: This is the FAQ for the x86 Assembly Language programmers for the alt.lang.asm and comp.lang.asm.x86 newsgroups. This particular section of the FAQ is part one of three parts that contain x86 assembly language information common to all assemblers. Keywords: x86 Assemby Language ASM FAQ General Archive-Name: assembly-language/x86/general/part1 Posting-Frequency: monthly (21st of every month) Last-modified: 1997/03/18 ------------------------------ Subject: 1. Introduction and Intent This is the x86 Assembly Language FAQ for the comp.lang.asm.x86 and alt.lang.asm newsgroups. This FAQ is posted monthly on or about the 21st of the month on both newsgroups and news.answers, alt.answers and comp.answers. It also is archived at the normal FAQ archival sites and the SimTel mirror sites in the msdos/info directory. Lastly, the current version is available from my web page as: As text files: http://www2.dgsys.com/~raymoon/faq/asmfaq.zip As html documents: http://www2.dgsys.com/~raymoon/faq/asmfaqh.zip Currently, this FAQ is broken into six sections. The following are the section filenames and the scope of each section of the FAQ. assembly-language/x86/general/part1 - This is the basic portion of the FAQ that contains information of interest to all assembly language programmers. In general, the information contained in this portion of the FAQ is not specific to any particular assembler. assembly-language/x86/general/part2 - This is a continuation of the above FAQ. assembly-language/x86/general/part3 - This is a continuation of the above FAQ. assembly-language/x86/microsoft - This portion of the FAQ contains information specific for the Microsoft MASM. assembly-language/x86/borland - This portion of the FAQ contains information specific for the Borland TASM. assembly-language/x86/a86 - This portion of the FAQ contains information specific for the Shareware A86 Assembler and D86 Debugger. The scope and content of this FAQ is to go beyond just answering the frequently asked questions. I am including pointers to assembly language treasure troves that are hidden out on the internet. I believe that this will enhance the FAQ's value not only to the novices but also to the old hands. For the ease of determining what has changed since the last FAQ, the Table of Contents will have "REVISED" at the end of the subject line for all revised subjects. If more than one FAQ revision has been missed, the "Last Changed:" entry at the end of each subject can be used to determine which subjects have been revised during the intervening time frame. The information in this FAQ is free for all to use as long as you acknowledge the source. This FAQ can be reproduced in part or in its entirety as long as the copyright is included. This FAQ can be made available on public servers, like ftp, gopher or WWW servers. Please do not modify the file, such as converting it into some other format, without prior permission of the author. All references to files and locations are in Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) format. Some web browser will be able to use these URLs directly as hot links. If the format is not clear to you, get RFC 1738. It is available from: ftp://ds.internic.net/rfc/rfc1738.txt Suggestions for changes and comments are always welcome. They can be posted to either newsgroup or e-mailed directly to the me. Author: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Copyright 1997 - Raymond Moon ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Last Changed: 6 Jan 97 ------------------------------ Subject: 2. Table of Contents Part I 1. Introduction and Intent 2. Table of Contents 3. Charters For comp.lang.asm.x86 and alt.lang.asm Newsgroups 4. What is Assembly Language 5. List of x86 OpCodes 6. What is HELPPC and Where It Is Available 7. How To Truncate a File 8. How Can STDERR Be Redirected To a File 9. How To Determine the CPU Type 10. IRQ Assignments 11. Ralf Brown's Interrupt List 12. Using VGA Mode 13h for Fast Graphics 13. Real Mode/Protected Mode 14. Shareware ASM Libraries Part II 15. Accessing 4 Gegs of Memory in Real Mode 16. What Is Available at developer.intel.com 17. Interrupts and Exceptions 18. ASM Books Available 19. ASM Code Available on Internet 20. How To Commit a File 21. Using Extended Memory Manager 22. EXE2BIN Replacement 23. ASM Tutorials Available on the Internet 24. Shareware Assemblers 25. Undocumented OpCodes Part III 26. WWW Assembly HomePages 27. Common Reason Why Memory Allocation Fails 28. Volume Serial Numbers 29. .obj File Format 30. Rebooting from Software 31. Other FAQs 32. Pseudo Random Number Generator in Assembly Language 33. Command Line Arguments 34. Free 32-bit and DJGPP 35. TERSE Programming Language 36. Assembly Language IDEs 37. Disassemblers 38. How to Optimize for the Pentium 39. Acknowledgments ------------------------------ Subject: 3. Charters For comp.lang.asm.x86 and alt.lang.asm Newsgroups To know whether or not these newsgroups will meet your needs, the purpose for which they were created are given below. 3.1 COMP.LANG.ASM.X86 comp.lang.asm.x86 was created based upon voting on a Request for Discussion (RFD). The RFD for this newsgroup is: The unmoderated newsgroup comp.lang.asm.x86 is open to discussions on all topics related to assembly language and low-level programming on IBM machines with '86 processors. Appropriate topics would include, but not be limited to: Assembly language tips and tricks (code techniques) MASM, TASM, and other commercial assemblers Graphics, sound, and other hardware programming Assembly language code Assembly language related share/freeware Linking assembly language with other languages Etc... Topics that are discouraged are: Flames about "{Language X} is {better/worse} than ASM" Flames like "{Assembler 1} is {better/worse} than {Assembler 2}" High-level language code, except when used for hardware programming 3.2 ALT.LANG.ASM Alt newsgroups are initiated with a Proposal posting to the alt.config newsgroup. The proposal for alt.lang.asm is: alt.lang.asm will address the problems of machine language programmers out there in InterNet land. It will be a forum for discussion of coding techniques and efficiency problems related to machine language. The scope will be broad. We will not discriminate by machine architecture, race or sex. Contributors: Michael Averbuch, mikeaver@firefly.prairienet.org Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 28 Dec 94 ------------------------------ Subject: 4. What Is Assembly Language 4.1 WHAT IS MACHINE LANGUAGE? Although programmers tend to use C or C++ or Pascal these days, the language closest to the PC hardware is machine language. Not one second during a PCs powered on lifetime passes where the computer is not executing machine language. 4.2 ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE OR MACHINE LANGUAGE To word this simply, you can say that say that assembly language is a human-readable text, and machine language is machine-readable binary code. When you program in assembly language, you are programming on the machine language level. To program directly in machine language is teadious, so you use assembly language instead, and use an assembler to produce the actual machine code. 4.3 WHEN TO USE ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE I personally think that except as a learning exercise it's a waste of time writing something in asm that can be written acceptably fast in a high-level language. Assembly language fits for the following: * Low level control. When you need to change the flags, or the control registers of the processor, as when entering protected mode. * Speed. Programs written in machine language execute fast! It can execute 10-100 times the speed of BASIC, and about twice as fast as a program written in C or Pascal. * Time Critical Code. Critical sections of programs written in higher level languages, can be written in assembly to speed up sections. * Small program size. When you write a TSR for example this is very useful. Writing interrupt handlers is where assembly language shines. Assembly language is very flexible and powerful, anything that the hardware of the computer is capable of doing can be done in assembly. Contributor: Patrik Ohman, patrik@astrakan.hgs.se Last changed: 10 Jan 95 ------------------------------ Subject: 5. List Of x86 OpCodes 5.1 x86 OPCODES The best source of OpCodes up to and including the Pentium Pro processor is in the Intel Architecture Software Developer's Manual, Volume 2: Instruction Set Reference Manual. It is available in .pdf format from Intel's Web Site: http://developer.intel.com/design/pro/MANUALS/243191_1.pdf 5.2 MMX OPCODES Intel has a chapter covering these new OpCodes in the MMX Technology Programmer's Reference Manual. This chapter is Chapter Five - Intel Architecture MMX Instruction Set. http://developer.intel.com/drg/mmx/Manuals/prm/PRM_CHP5.HTM 5.3 OTHER SOURCES OF THESE DOCUMENTS These manuals are available on the Intel Developer's CD-ROM, see Subject #16. You also can find these manuals on Robert Collins' Web Site: http://www.x86.org/intel.doc/IntelDocs.html or Christian Luddoff's Web Site: http://www.sandpile.org/xxx Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 8 Mar 97 ------------------------------ Subject: 6. What Is HELPPC and Where Is It Available HELPPC is a Quick Reference Utility for the intermediate to advanced programmer. It is a shareware program written by David Jurgens. The latest version is 2.10 The topics distributed in an easy database format are: BIOS interrupts; DOS interrupts and DOS functions; EMS and Mouse functions; BIOS and DOS data structures; diagnostic codes; DOS commands; 80x86 assembler instructions; standard and vendor specific C functions; and various hardware specifications. HELPPC is customizable by users. The documentation describes how users can incorporate their own information into the help file format. These user help files then can be incorporated into the database and accessed via HELPPC application. HELPPC comes in two versions. The first is a DOS command line program. The second is a TSR. The TSR supports context sensitive help within many editors. Only 32K is taken by the TSR version. HELPPC requires: DOS 2.0 or greater; 64K of RAM for DOS Command Line or 32K for TSR; and hard disk recommended. HELPPC is available specifically from: ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/info/helppc21.zip HELPPC also is available from any site that mirrors the SimTel directory. Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 28 Dec 94 ------------------------------ Subject: 7. How To Truncate A File There is not any single DOS Int 21h function that performs this operation. A file can be truncated using two functions. The procedure is: 1. Use Int 21h function 42h, Move File Pointer, to move the file pointer to the position where you want the file to be truncated. 2. Use Int 21h function 40h, Write File or Device, to write zero bytes to the file. Execution of the last DOS function will update the directory to the new file length. Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 28 Dec 94 ------------------------------ Subject: 8. How Can STDERR Be Redirected To A File I understand that 4DOS has this capability at its command line. If you are looking in the assembly language FAQ for this information, an assembly language answer probably is desired. Here it is. You will need to write a short program that performs the STDERR redirection before loading and executing the desired program. This loader program relies upon the fact that a child program inherits all open files of the parent program unless the parent program opens a file with the inheritance flag set to no. Because the full code for such a program is too large for this FAQ, I will give the salient specifications for such a program. 1. The loader program accepts three command line arguments: a. The full path and filename of the file into which STDERR is to be written. b. The full path and filename of the program to be executed. c. The command line for the program to be executed (should be delimited by double quotes to allow multiple arguments). This argument is optional. 2. Release all memory above the program using Int 21 function 4ah so that there will be room enough to load and execute the designated program. 3. Open the file from step 1.a above into which STDERR is to be written. 4. Duplicate STDERR filehandle, which is 2, using Int 21h function 45h. 5. Using Int 21h function 46h, force STDERR filehandle, again 2, to have the filehandle of the opened file from step 2. 6. Use Int 21h function 4b00h to load and execute the program from step 1.a. Use the default environment and the command line from step 1.c above. 7. Upon return from the function 4b00h, close the file opened in step 2. 8. To restore STDERR, use Int 21h function 46h to force STDERR, again 2, to point to the filehandle saved from step 3 above. This same technique can be applied to any of the standard devices. I have written a full featured demonstration program. I believe that asm programmers will find the source code useful even if they do not want to redirect stderr to a file. The URL to the file is: ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/stderrf.zip Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 3 Jun 95 ------------------------------ Subject: 9. How To Determine The CPU Type 9.1 CPUID PROGRAM The type of processor and math coprocessor can be determined using two functions that have been provided by Intel. The source code to these functions can be obtained from Intel by: ftp://ftp.intel.com/pub/IAL/tools_utils_demos/cpuid3.zip Three source files are included in this .zip file. cpuid3a.asm - This source code file contains two assembly language functions. One determines the type of cpu from 8088/8086 to Pentium. The second detects and identifies, if present, the type of math coprocessor. cpuid3b.c - a c program that calls the above two functions and displaysthe results. cpuid3c.asm - this is an assembly program equivalent to cpuid3b.c. 9.2 AP-485 INTEL PROCESSOR IDENTIFICATION WITH THE CPUID INSTRUCTION This Application Note explains how to use the CPUID instruction in software applications, BIOS implementations, and various processor tools. By taking advantage of the CPUID instruction, software developers can create software applications and tools that can execute compatibly across the widest range of Intel processor generations and models, past, present, and future. http://developer.intel.com/design/pro/applnots/241618.HTM 9.3 Robert Collins' CPUID.ASM Robert Collins has written two columns for Dr. Dobb's Journal on this subject. These articles with source code is available on his web site: http://www.x86.org/ddj/ddj.html 9.4 Grzegorz Mazur's x86 CPU Identification Grzegorz has a series of hypertext articles that explain x86 CPU identification algorithms developed by himself. Covered are not only the Intel chips but also V20, V30 (remember them), and Cyrix and alikes. His page is located: http://grafi.ii.pw.edu.pl/gbm/x86/index.html Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 18 Mar 97 ------------------------------ Subject: 10. IRQ Assignments A list of IRQ assignments are available in David Jurgens' HELPPC database. See Subject #6 for details on how to obtain this program. Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 28 Dec 94 ------------------------------ Subject: 11. Ralf Brown's Interrupt List 11.1 FILE AVAILABILITY The latest version of Ralf Brown's Interrupt List is 5.1, dated 28 Jul 96. The files are available directly from his home page, from SimTel, or Garbo: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/ralf/pub/WWW/files.html ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/info ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/programming The files are: inter53a.zip Comprehensive listing of interrupt calls, 1of4 inter53b.zip Comprehensive listing of interrupt calls, 2of4 inter53c.zip Comprehensive listing of interrupt calls, 3of4 inter53d.zip Comprehensive listing of interrupt calls, 4of4 inter53e.zip Utility progs/source code for interrupt list inter53f.zip WinHelp conversion programs for interrupt list inter53g.zip Hypertext conversion progs. for interrupt list Above available from all sites. Below files are available from SimTel inter53z.zip HC31/HCP phrases file for interrupt list intwin53.zip WINHELP hypertext 11.2 DESCRIPTION The interrupt list is a comprehensive listing of functions available through interrupt calls and FAR calls, both documented and (officially) undocumented, plus maps of CMOS and BIOS memory and I/O ports. This release contains more than 8100 entries and nearly 3300 tables. 11.3 WHAT IS NEW Version 5.1 COMBINE.BAT has been replaced by COMBINE.COM. New info includes PCMCIA v2, Player's Tool, ShowGFX, Iomega, additional virus checks, OS/2 INT 21h, and various miscellaneous updates. Version 5.2 Three new hypertext conversion programs (for WinHelp, ASMEdit, and Turbo Pascal) and a new text file MSR.LST. INTLIST.E has been enhanced, a repeated error in Novell NetWare multiplexor functions has been corrected, and a variety of incorrect cross-references has been fixed. New info includes APM v1.2, TI Professional PC BIOS, Cherry keyboard chipcard reader, KeyRus, Volkov Commander, and XPACK. Version 5.3 More than 370k of updates, including ACPI, OpenHCI, PCI configuration registers for various Intel chipsets, SCSI CDB and ASPI updates, Novell TCP/IP API, Banyan VINES printing, additional virus installation checks, MODRES, Toshiba model IDs, MS-DOS7/Win95 info, FAT32, CardBus, InterWave Game API, PCI Power Management, ATAPI Removable Media, and an updated OPCODES.LST (now includes MMX instructions) 11.4 INTWIN.HLP INTWIN.HLP was compiled from Ralf Brown's Interrupt List with Christian Mueller Planitz's and Bent Lynggaard's INT2WHLP program to a hypertext format of the List. Most of the supplementary *.LST files in the Interrupt List are included in INTWIN.HLP. INTWIN displays table references in a secondary window to ease the reference between the source and the referenced text. The package includes an editor to edit the secondary window size as appropriate for the graphics platform used. INTWIN has extensive search facilities with almost 30,000 keywords (below WinHelp 4.00's keyword limit) for search on interrupt numbers, register contents, interrupt categories, and topic headings. The package includes also a full text search facility. 11.5 INTWIN.PH INTWIN.PH is a phrases (Windows help file compression information) file compiled from Ralf Brown's Interrupt List with Christian Mueller Planitz's and Bent Lynggaard's INT2WHLP program. Most of the supplementary *.LST files in the Interrupt List were included in the compilation. The phrases file is used by the HC31 and HCP help file compiles when compiling in high compression mode. The compilation of this phrases file requires more DOS memory and disk space than is easily available on many computers (630-730 kb and 38-52 Mb). 11.6 OTHER INCLUDED GEMS OVERVIEW.LST - A brief description of each of the 256 interrupts. 86BUGS.LST - A list of undocumented and buggy instructions with descriptions of the x86 Intel processor and compatible processors. And you thought that the Intel FDIV was the first bug in a processor! CMOS.LST - a CMOS memory map. OPCODE.LST - A list of undocumented instructions and documented instructions of any last processor. PORTS.LST - I/O port addressed for XT, AT and PS/2 computers. GLOSSARY.LST - glossary of PC terms. MEMORY.LST - The format for various memory locations, such as the BIOS Data Segment, Interrupt Vector Table, and much, much more. INTERRUP.PRI - iAPX 86 Interrupt Primer Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 19 Jan 97 ------------------------------ Subject: 12. Using VGA Mode 13h for Fast Graphics 12.1 INTRODUCTION AND PREPARATION Mode 13h is so widely used for graphics applications in DOS because it is very easy to use. The screen is constantly being redrawn by the video card. To affect what the card draws, it is necessary to write to the screen buffer. The screen buffer in mode 13h is always at segment:offset = A000:0000. Thus, to set up drawing directly to the video buffer, this is what you'd most often first do: ;Change the video mode to 13h xor ah, ah ;VIDEO Function 00h: Change screen mov al, 13h ;Put the desired graphics mode into AL int 10h ;Call VIDEO ;Prepare for writing to the video buffer mov di, 0a000h ;Put the video segment into DI mov es, di ; so it can easily be put into ES xor di, di ;Start writing at coordinates (0,0) 12.2 WRITING PIXELS TO THE SCREEN Why is Mode 13h so popular? To understand, you must know a few basic facts. In Mode 13h, the screen is 320 by 200, or 320 pixels across and 200 pixels down. In each pixel, there's a possibility of 256 colors, which can be fit into one byte. Thus, 320*200*1 = 64000 bytes, about the size of one segment. Think of the screen as an array of colors. The first row takes up addresses A000:0000 to A000:013F (decimal 319), the second row takes up addresses A000:0140 to A000:027F (decimal 639), and so on. To plot a pixel, assuming ES=A000: ;Plot a pixel in video mode 13h, where ;PixelAddress = (320 * Y) + X mov ax, 320 ; Prepare for the multiplication mul [Y] ; Assuming that Y is defined in the data segment ; earlier in the program mov di, ax ; Put in into the pointer to the offset of ES add di, [X] ; Assuming that X is defined in the data segment ; earlier in the program mov al, [Color] ; Assuming that Color is defined in the data ; segment earlier in the program stosb ; Write it to the screen! See how easy that was? Something to remember is that it is zero-based. The upper-left corner is (0,0), and the lower-right is (319,199). A complete TASM Ideal mode procedure might look something like this (it assumes that the video card is already set to mode 13h): PROC WritePixel BASIC ; Or whatever language you might want to link ; it to USES es, di ; It's always a good idea to preserve ES and DI ARG X:word, Y:word, Color:BYTE mov di, 0a000h ; Put the video segment into DI mov es, di ; so it can easily be put into ES mov ax, 320 ; Prepare for the multiplication mul [Y] ; Offset pointer by the Y value passed in mov di, ax ; Put in into pointer to the offset of ES add di, [X] ; Offset the pointer by the X value passed in mov al, [Color] ; Put color to be written to the screen in AL stosb ; Write it to the screen! ret ENDP WritePixel To write a horizontal line, just put the length in CX, and replace the STOSB with a REP STOSB. Writing a vertical line is only a little more tricky. Observe the following TASM Ideal mode procedure: PROC VerticalLine BASIC ; Or whatever language you might want to link ; it to USES es, di ; It's always a good idea to preserve ES and ; DI ARG X:word, Y:word, Color:BYTE, Length:word mov di, 0a000h ; Put the video segment into DI mov es, di ; so it can easily be put into ES mov ax, 320 ; Prepare for the multiplication mul [Y] ; Offset the pointer by the Y value passed in mov di, ax ; Put in into the pointer to the offset of ES add di, [X] ; Offset the pointer by the X value passed in mov al, [Color] ; Put the color to be written to the screen ; in AL mov cx, [Length] ; Prepare for the loop YLoop: stosb ; Write it to the screen! add di, 319 ; Move down one row (DI has already advanced ; once because of the STOSB, thus the 319) loop YLoop ret ENDP VerticleLine Observe how there is a tight loop that moves DI down one row each iteration. In short, the easiest way to write directly to the Mode 13h video buffer is to think of the screen as just a 320 by 200 array of bytes, starting at A000:0000. Author: Michael Averbuch (mikeaver@prairienet.org) Last Change: 29 Dec 94 ------------------------------ Subject: 13. Real Mode/Protected Mode 13.1 AVAILABILITY [Note: because of a crash at zfja-gate, the below information of files on zfja-gate may not be accurate.] All the files below are available from: ftp://zfja-gate.fuw.edu.pl/user/net/ka9q/guest/cpu/protect.mod The authors e-mail addresses are given below. These files can be received by e-mail. Send e-mail to: listserv@zfja-gate.fuw.edu.pl with GET CPU/PROTECT.MOD/PMFAQ/* in the text. A .zip file with all the latest files described below has been uploaded to SimTel but as of 19 Dec has not been made available for download. The URL to this file when available should be: ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/pmtut002.zip Watch this site or for the upload announcement in the newsgroups. 13.2 FAQ - PMFAQ.ZIP This file contains a preliminary protected mode FAQ by Jerzy Tarasiuk. 13.3 TUTORIAL - PMTUT002.ZIP Till Gerken has written a Protected Mode Tutorial. This tutorial contains code and applicable function calls that comprise the Virtual Control Program Interface (VCPI). Till Gerken's tutorial is available: ftp://x2ftp.oulu.fi/pub/msdos/programming/pmode/pmtut002.zip 13.4 SAMPLE ASM CODE - SIMPL_PM.ASM Jerzy Tarasiuk has posted an example program switching to Protected Mode and back to again to Real Mode. 13.5 REAL MODE IDT SWITCHING - CHANGIDT.FAQ Lastly Jerzy Tarasiuk has included some of his e-mail that covers real mode IDT switching. Contributors: Till Gerken, tig@ngo.ol.ni.schule.de, and Jerzy Tarasiuk, JT@zfja-gate.fuw.edu.pl Last changed: 19 Dec 95 ------------------------------ Subject: 14. Shareware ASM Libraries 14.1 ASMLIB PROGRAMMER'S TOOLKIT, VERSION 4.0 Douglas Herr's shareware assembly language library. This library is available from SimTel. ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/asmlib40.zip The zip file contains only the medium model of the library. There are 405 assembly subroutines in a .lib file and documentation. Source code is available with registration and extra fee. The library covers the following areas: string/integer data manipulation screen mode subroutines text-mode multi-window subroutines disk & file subroutines text-mode video subroutines EMS and XMS subroutines floating-point subroutines graphics keyboard input subroutines mathematical solutions subroutines which determine PC status asmlib40 also comes with an editor, E16, written entirely with asmlib. Improvements since version 3.7 is auto-sizing of the near heap in the startup code. There have been some incremental improvements including 32k-color graphics and virtual graphics screens. 14.2 THE ASSEMBLY WIZARD'S LIBRARY, VERSION 2.1 This is Chris Walker's shareware assembly language library. This library used to be Thomas Hanlin's. ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/asmwiz21.zip This library comes with documentation and one .lib file that supports small and tiny memory models. Source code is available with registration. The library covers the following areas: Base Conversions Mouse Services Exception Handling Sound and Music Delays and Countdowns String Services File Handling Telecommunications Filename Manipulation Time and Date Keyboard Services Video Services Long Integer Math Miscellaneous Services Memory Services 14.3 UCR Standard Library for Assembly Language Programmers This library is written by Randall Hyde and others. This library is available from many sites but most of them are seriously out of date. You can get the latest version at: http://webster.ucr.edu/Page_asm/RHUCRLib.html Unlike the previous libraries, there are no registrations fees and the included source code is released to the public domain. The author does request that if you use the library, you contribute at least one routine to the library. Standard Input Routines Character Set Routines Standard Output Routines Memory Management Routines Conversion Routines String Handling Routines Utility Routines 14.4 ALIB Version 3.0 ALIB is Jeff Ownens' shareware assembly language library. This library is available from SimTel. ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/alib30.zip Like the UCR library described above, registration fees are not requested. The library consists of 179 assembly source files covering the following areas: compress - data compression and expansion config - program configuration, colors, paths, etc. compare - compare strings convert - hex/decimal/ascii conversions database - simple database functions disk - disk information, path changes, file searches display - fast display functions, write to display memory error - error handlers float - simple floating point math package math - dword math, crc, roots memory - memory manager, extended, xms, ems, conventional menu - menuing system message - messages in windows on screen misc - misc routines mouse/key - mouse and keyboard functions parse - extraction of parameters from command line random - random number generators search - search for character or string sort - sort buffer or file sound - sounds string - ascii string handling stdout - characters, strings, spaces to stdout system - system interrogation and setup time - time and date conversions 14.5 FREELIB, Version 3.0 Freelib v3.0 is a library of 200 routines that may be useful for assembly language programming. Freelib includes routines that do many of the tasks that make assembly language difficult - like buffered file I/O, formatted string output, memory allocation, etc. Also includes 16.16bit fixed point arithmetic, text screen output (EGA 80x25 or VGA 90x34), and VGA graphics in both 16 and 256 colors. All routines are highly optimized for size and speed, and average only 60 bytes each. Full source code and documentation is included for all routines. Freelib is public domain software, free for non-commercial use. The library is available from SimTel: ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/asmutl/freeli30.zip Contributor: Raymond Moon, raymoon@moonware.dgsys.com Last changed: 20 Dec 96