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A heartfelt tribute to Robot Odyssey and Rocky's Boots, games that inspired me to become a chip design engineer when I was just a wee foxling. When it was time for me to choose a major as an undergraduate, I thought back to these games. "Chip design seems fun and I already know that I can do it!"
Is there a game that opened doors and unlocked worlds for you?
Is there a game that opened doors and unlocked worlds for you?
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Species Raccoon
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File Size 759.9 kB
In those days, 1982-84, I was studying engineering, and teaching myself how to program on my Apple ][+. I wrote a version of Conway's Game of Life in 6502 asm that used the hi-res screens on the Apple.
My first "logic trainer" was a "Science Fair SF-5000" from Radio Shack (cat. no. 28-199): effectively just ten 5-pole double-throw slide switches, ten light bulbs, and a pushbutton switch. But you could wire up series-parallel combinational logic circuits, with inputs being the switches' positions, and the manual gave an introduction to Boolean algebra and logic gates.
After that, I got an account on a PDP-8 system at the university, where I learned Basic and PDP-8 assembly language. Then I took a summer camp for kids: 1 week of Fortran (on punchcards), and then a week playing computer games... except I used the first 4 "games" days writing more Fortran code, trying to solve the Pentominoes puzzle (fit the 12 Pentominoes into a 6x10 rectangle). No joy, but at least I learned Fortran IV that weekend.
Then I took a continuing ed. evening course on microcomputers. The textbook was Intel's MCS-80 manual for the i8080. The first assignment was design a PCB for a SRAM memory array; the second assignment was design and build a 4-state logic probe. So, it introduced me to sequential logic design. That led to me wire-wrapping an i8085 system, with 4 KB of SRAM (expandable to 8KB), 5 parallel I/O ports (5x8212), 8 LEDs for output, 8 toggle switches for input. I added a 9-digit 7-segment LED display pulled out of my calculator, and a surplus PET 2001 chicklet-style keyboard. I used an old train transformer for the power supply. I had no way of programming or erasing eproms, so I used the "Dirt-Cheap Bootstrap" idea from Byte magazine: single step the CPU, while re-directing memory reads to an input port, but allowing memory writes to go through to memory.
Then I got a Sinclair ZX-81 kit in 1981, and the Apple ][+ as a kit in 1982. That was fun until I got an Amiga in 1985.
Eventually I did take a VLSI design course, and learned some VHDL for the course project which was a GCD calculator on an Actel FPGA. I've always wanted to be a chip designer...I just need to sit down and play with the FPGA dev boards I have, I guess.
My first "logic trainer" was a "Science Fair SF-5000" from Radio Shack (cat. no. 28-199): effectively just ten 5-pole double-throw slide switches, ten light bulbs, and a pushbutton switch. But you could wire up series-parallel combinational logic circuits, with inputs being the switches' positions, and the manual gave an introduction to Boolean algebra and logic gates.
After that, I got an account on a PDP-8 system at the university, where I learned Basic and PDP-8 assembly language. Then I took a summer camp for kids: 1 week of Fortran (on punchcards), and then a week playing computer games... except I used the first 4 "games" days writing more Fortran code, trying to solve the Pentominoes puzzle (fit the 12 Pentominoes into a 6x10 rectangle). No joy, but at least I learned Fortran IV that weekend.
Then I took a continuing ed. evening course on microcomputers. The textbook was Intel's MCS-80 manual for the i8080. The first assignment was design a PCB for a SRAM memory array; the second assignment was design and build a 4-state logic probe. So, it introduced me to sequential logic design. That led to me wire-wrapping an i8085 system, with 4 KB of SRAM (expandable to 8KB), 5 parallel I/O ports (5x8212), 8 LEDs for output, 8 toggle switches for input. I added a 9-digit 7-segment LED display pulled out of my calculator, and a surplus PET 2001 chicklet-style keyboard. I used an old train transformer for the power supply. I had no way of programming or erasing eproms, so I used the "Dirt-Cheap Bootstrap" idea from Byte magazine: single step the CPU, while re-directing memory reads to an input port, but allowing memory writes to go through to memory.
Then I got a Sinclair ZX-81 kit in 1981, and the Apple ][+ as a kit in 1982. That was fun until I got an Amiga in 1985.
Eventually I did take a VLSI design course, and learned some VHDL for the course project which was a GCD calculator on an Actel FPGA. I've always wanted to be a chip designer...I just need to sit down and play with the FPGA dev boards I have, I guess.
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