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Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

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Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#41

Post by laconicmatt »

astrange wrote: post #29
markus_zhang wrote: post #12

I think Computer Architecture can be designed around legacy but fun hardwares. So instead of using some fantasy machines such as LC-3, students can directly get into the world of 6502. First semester: mostly concentrated on 6502 with a full 6502 CPU emulator as the final project. Second semester: concentrate on a real machine such as the NES. Students need to learn to improve their emulators to program in it (so, do…

6502 would give them a dose of reality, but I think teaching people by having them program an 8-bit CISC chip is cruel. There's so many asymmetries that get in the way. (Also, I don't think anyone actually likes NES games except for nostalgia, but this might just be because square waves make my ears hurt.)

This just isn't true. There are plenty of very good NES games that have great game loops and are a blast to play. Some of the good ones have quirks or unintuitive controls but are still quite enjoyable.

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#42

Post by pjc50 »

hinkley wrote: post #3

If I were king of the forest, there would be a degree program in Comparative Coding (comparative lit for code). We don’t treat this as a creative discipline and thus we don’t spend time looking at masters, how they were successful and the ways they were just as human as anyone. Someone would get paid for writing stuff like this, same as people getting paid to write about Poe, Cummings, Hemingway, Thoreau. But I guess…

The MIT "platform studies" series is quite close to that, http://platformstudies.com/

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#43

Post by stevenAthompson »

nradov wrote: post #18
KerrAvon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't actually care one way or another about that particular subject, but if you start making judgements about academic fields of study are worthwhile to pay for on the basis of value to society, you allow other people -- more ignorant people, let's say -- with different concepts of societal value to make somewhat unfortunate decisions. You might end up without any new literature at all.

Very little literature is written by academics. People who want to write new literature can just go ahead and do it. In a world of limited time and resources we always make judgements about which academic fields of study are worthwhile. At some level it's a zero-sum game: time spent on comparative literature is time not spent on philosophy or history or creative writing. So, given that we have to prioritize which peo…

> At some level it's a zero-sum game

To live a life thinking this way outside of work would fill me with existential despair. Life well lived is more than a mere exercise in market efficiency.

Academia isn't supposed to maximize our return on investment, and the people who made this their lives work didn't choose the field because it was the highest pay they could obtain or the thing which contributed the most to the orphan crushing machine (the economy).

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#44

Post by nradov »

stevenAthompson wrote: post #43
nradov wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very little literature is written by academics. People who want to write new literature can just go ahead and do it. In a world of limited time and resources we always make judgements about which academic fields of study are worthwhile. At some level it's a zero-sum game: time spent on comparative literature is time not spent on philosophy or history or creative writing. So, given that we have to prioritize which peo…

> At some level it's a zero-sum game To live a life thinking this way outside of work would fill me with existential despair. Life well lived is more than a mere exercise in market efficiency. Academia isn't supposed to maximize our return on investment, and the people who made this their lives work didn't choose the field because it was the highest pay they could obtain or the thing which contributed the most to the…

As a society with limited resources we can't pay an infinite number of academics. If we pay more of them to do comparative literature then that necessarily means we pay fewer to do other stuff like history or philosophy. So, given that we need to make hard choices, which criteria should we use? It doesn't have to be ROI but there has to be some kind of rational basis for making decisions.

This is how things work in the real world. Enjoy your existential despair.

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#45

Post by stevenAthompson »

nradov wrote: post #44
stevenAthompson wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At some level it's a zero-sum game To live a life thinking this way outside of work would fill me with existential despair. Life well lived is more than a mere exercise in market efficiency. Academia isn't supposed to maximize our return on investment, and the people who made this their lives work didn't choose the field because it was the highest pay they could obtain or the thing which contributed the most to the…

As a society with limited resources we can't pay an infinite number of academics. If we pay more of them to do comparative literature then that necessarily means we pay fewer to do other stuff like history or philosophy. So, given that we need to make hard choices, which criteria should we use? It doesn't have to be ROI but there has to be some kind of rational basis for making decisions. This is how things work in t…

> So, given that we need to make hard choices, what criteria should we use?

That's a great question. I suppose we should start by asking ourselves who is currently paying them. It seems to me that would mostly be the for profit colleges who offer liberal arts degrees.

So far, letting "the free market" decide seems to be working for the most part. Although I am concerned that people are forgetting the value of having an educated popluace, and conversations like this one reinforce that fear. Do you know that 20% of Americans are functionally illiterate and the 54% read below the sixth grade level now?

It sounds like there is a quiet part you aren't saying out loud here, and I'm curious what it is? Do you feel that the government should be limiting access to education in some way?

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#46

Post by fifilura »

wkat4242 wrote: post #14
hinkley wrote: post #3

If I were king of the forest, there would be a degree program in Comparative Coding (comparative lit for code). We don’t treat this as a creative discipline and thus we don’t spend time looking at masters, how they were successful and the ways they were just as human as anyone. Someone would get paid for writing stuff like this, same as people getting paid to write about Poe, Cummings, Hemingway, Thoreau. But I guess…

I was talking to a friend who works in development and he says that they even frown on recursion now. They think it's too complex and causes junior programmers to footgun. It's a shame because recursive code is often the most clean, elegant and fast for things like traversing trees.

I don't really write code that traverse trees that often these days. I do use libraries or services (e.g. SQL databases) that do though.

And I have no idea whether the implementation of map/reduce I use is implemented as a recursive function or not, I just use it.

If your friend works with implementing libraries or database engines I would be a bit shocked. If he implements applications and services I could agree that keeping things simple and not inventing your own frameworks could be a good idea.

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#47

Post by robocat »

KerrAvon wrote: post #15
nradov wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Should people get paid to write about Poe, Cummings, Hemingway, Thoreau? The original works themselves are pretty accessible. People can just read them and form their own interpretations. I'm skeptical that I really gained anything from reading literary criticism, at least it didn't make me appreciate the original works more or make me a better writer. I understand that there's a long tradition of scholarship in comp…

I don't actually care one way or another about that particular subject, but if you start making judgements about academic fields of study are worthwhile to pay for on the basis of value to society, you allow other people -- more ignorant people, let's say -- with different concepts of societal value to make somewhat unfortunate decisions. You might end up without any new literature at all.

Your comment is bunk: should society also pay for people's hobbies? Should we spend 100% of our economic output on humanities?

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#48

Post by nradov »

stevenAthompson wrote: post #45
nradov wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a society with limited resources we can't pay an infinite number of academics. If we pay more of them to do comparative literature then that necessarily means we pay fewer to do other stuff like history or philosophy. So, given that we need to make hard choices, which criteria should we use? It doesn't have to be ROI but there has to be some kind of rational basis for making decisions. This is how things work in t…

> So, given that we need to make hard choices, what criteria should we use? That's a great question. I suppose we should start by asking ourselves who is currently paying them. It seems to me that would mostly be the for profit colleges who offer liberal arts degrees. So far, letting "the free market" decide seems to be working for the most part. Although I am concerned that people are forgetting the value of having…

On the contrary, I don't think government should be limiting access to education. But for publicly funded schools we should continuously re-evaluate the optimal required (i.e. non-elective) curriculum. Students only have limited time available to learn. Time spent on one subject like comparative literature is time not spent on other subjects like philosophy or statistics or foreign languages. So, given that it's a zero-sum game, what is the optimal amount of time spent on comparative literature? At some point you have to put aside the platitudes about "knowledge for knowledge's sake" and get to specifics about how many teachers to hire in each academic field.

There are very few for-profit colleges that offer liberal arts degree. Almost all colleges that pay academics to teach comparative literature are government or non-profit institutions. (Sure, you can buy an English degree of dubious quality from a for-profit school like University of Phoenix but the numbers there are tiny.)

Illiteracy is a symptom of a fundamental breakdown in the primary education system before students are even exposed to more complex liberal arts subjects like comparative literature. So I have no idea what point you're trying to make there.

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#49

Post by lttlrck »

brucehoult wrote: post #31
markus_zhang wrote: post #12

I think Computer Architecture can be designed around legacy but fun hardwares. So instead of using some fantasy machines such as LC-3, students can directly get into the world of 6502. First semester: mostly concentrated on 6502 with a full 6502 CPU emulator as the final project. Second semester: concentrate on a real machine such as the NES. Students need to learn to improve their emulators to program in it (so, do…

> First semester: mostly concentrated on 6502 with a full 6502 CPU emulator as the final project. I like the principle, and the 6502 holds a special place in my heart as my introduction to machine code programming on an Apple ][ in late 1980 after I got bored with BASIC after two days .. self-taught from the ROM listing and 6502 reference in the back of the manual. But it's absolutely the wrong ISA today. RISC-V RV32…

Something with meaningful restrictions such as register count and RAM that you'll hit quickly when hand-coding assembler is a super IMHO useful teaching tool. 16 registers is luxurious!

Re: Elite on the 6502: The original 6502 assembly source, heavily commented

#50

Post by stevenAthompson »

nradov wrote: post #48
stevenAthompson wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So, given that we need to make hard choices, what criteria should we use? That's a great question. I suppose we should start by asking ourselves who is currently paying them. It seems to me that would mostly be the for profit colleges who offer liberal arts degrees. So far, letting "the free market" decide seems to be working for the most part. Although I am concerned that people are forgetting the value of having…

On the contrary, I don't think government should be limiting access to education. But for publicly funded schools we should continuously re-evaluate the optimal required (i.e. non-elective) curriculum. Students only have limited time available to learn. Time spent on one subject like comparative literature is time not spent on other subjects like philosophy or statistics or foreign languages. So, given that it's a ze…

You are technically correct, which is the best kind of correct. I concede the "zero-sum" point, thanks for taking the time to discuss it.

That's said, I still feel there is room to discuss which outcome we are trying to optimize for when we discuss the cost benefit of education and how to allocate those resources. Is the goal profit for employers, well adjusted complete cotizens who understand the world they live in, or something else?

I do suspect that our current attempts to laser focus on the skills most valuable to employers are short sighted, and frankly might be damaging society almost as much as the utter failure of primary education. That is why I mentioned the illiteracy issue before.

If only a minority can read well, and we are trying to "optimize" the learning outcomes of the remaining smaller percentage of competent students, we leave only a tiny percentage of well rounded and capable thinkers.

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