PDP-11 assembly language books

[Wendell]

I wanted to learn PDP-11 assembly, so I searched for all the books I
could find. To help anyone else, here they are. They fall into two
groups, 1) intro to machine architecture with PDP-11 for a CS3 type
course, and 2) short intros to assembly assuming you are already
familiar with the machine. I have included links to reviews when I
found them.

Cichanowski. 1982. MACRO-11 Programming and PDP-11 Organization. 248p.


Cooper. 1983. The Minicomputer in the Laboratory, 2e. 368p.
http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/entry.php?302-Review-of-quot-The-MiniComputer-in-the-Laboratory-quot-Cooper



Desautels. 1982. Assembly Language Programming for PDP-11 and LSI-11
Computers. 574p.


Early. 1984. Assembly Language: MACRO-11 and the PDP-11. 376p.


Frank. 1983. Introduction to the PDP-11 and Its Assembly Language.
480p.
http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=111714



Gill. 1983. Machine and Assembly Language Programming of the PDP-11,
2e. 211p.
http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/entry.php?299-Ancient-PDP-11-Progamming-in-Opcode-Book-Review



Hwang. 1986. MACRO-11 Assembly Language: Architecture and Structured
Programming. 608p.
http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=110609



Kapps. 1987. Assembly Language for the PDP-11, 2e. 438p


Lewis. 1981. An Introduction to Computer Programming and Data
Structures Using MACRO-11. 241p.


Lin. 1985. Computer Organization and Assembly Language Programming for
the PDP-11 and VAX-11. 384p.
http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=109701



Schneider. 1985. The Principles of Computer Organization. 544p.
http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=109750



Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p.


Shapiro. 1984. Assembler Language Programming for the PDP-11. 349p.


Singer. 1980. PDP-11: Assembler Language Programming and Machine
Organization. 190p.


Sowell. 1984. Programming in Assembly Language: Macro-11. 492p.
http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=111714



Southern. 1984. Structured Programming in Macro-11. 200p.


Zammit. 1984. MACRO-11 Programming. 130p.

[Jerome H. Fine]

If you decide to do everything as a legal hobby user and are willing
to use an emulator, SIMH is a free emulator and supports you to use
certain older versions of PDP-11 operating systems.  In particular,
V05.03 of RT-11 can be downloaded along with the DEC binary
distribution for V05.03 of RT-11.

You will also find it extremely helpful to:
(a)  Read the DEC MACRO-11 manual.
       There is a copy available for download, but I forget where.  Try bitsavers.
(b)  Decide which operating system you will learn.  It is not possible to completely
       separate writing code for the PDP-11 using MACRO-11 from the operating
       system.  RT-11 is probably the easiest to understand.  If you decide to use
       RT-11, read the manual which describes the RT-11 EMT requests.  There
       are many examples in this manual, mostly of the use of the EMT requests,
       but also valuable examples of actual programs.
(c)  Write a few very short programs, link them and execute.  You will need
       a debug program.  Under RT-11, SD(X).SYS is the easiest method since
       you don't need to link it into your program.
(d)  Try and have a few telephone conversations with someone who knows
       the operating system (which you choose to use) well and can help you get
       started.  There is almost too much to learn at the beginning, so just write
       the first couple of programs to see just how easy it actually is.
(e)  After you have a bit of experience, read the commented source code files
       for the operating system in which you are working if you are really serious
       and are looking for complex examples.

If you actually start and have questions we can answer here, please ask.

Jerome Fine

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <b6d9bb9b-c071-4739...@wt8g2000pbb.googlegroups.com>,

Wendell <wend...@yahoo.com> writes:
> I wanted to learn PDP-11 assembly, so I searched for all the books I
> could find. To help anyone else, here they are. They fall into two
> groups, 1) intro to machine architecture with PDP-11 for a CS3 type
> course, and 2) short intros to assembly assuming you are already
> familiar with the machine. I have included links to reviews when I
> found them.
>

.....

>
> Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p.
>

....

>
> Sowell. 1984. Programming in Assembly Language: Macro-11. 492p.
> http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=111714
>

I have these two and they are both great. I use them as references even
now. They are never put away. I am sure I have others, but these are,
by far, my favorites.

bill

--
Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves
bill...@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton |
Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include <std.disclaimer.h>

[Charles Richmond]

"Wendell" <wend...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:b6d9bb9b-c071-4739...@wt8g2000pbb.googlegroups.com...

>I wanted to learn PDP-11 assembly, so I searched for all the books I
> could find. To help anyone else, here they are. They fall into two
> groups, 1) intro to machine architecture with PDP-11 for a CS3 type
> course, and 2) short intros to assembly assuming you are already
> familiar with the machine. I have included links to reviews when I
> found them.
>

IMO, the trick is to learn the how the addressing modes and registers
interact... to produce the immediate mode, indirect mode, push and pop the
stack, etc. When you understand this, you will see what grouping of
assembly language symbols make sense and which don't.

--

numerist at aquaporin4 dot com

[Richard]

[Please do not mail me a copy of your followup]

"Jerome H. Fine" <ever...@nospam.com> spake the secret code
<50055545$0$284$1472...@news.sunsite.dk> thusly:

>You will also find it extremely helpful to:
>(a) Read the DEC MACRO-11 manual.
> There is a copy available for download, but I forget where. Try
>bitsavers.

<http://manx.classiccmp.org/search.php?cp=1&q=macro-11&on=on>

--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" free book <http://tinyurl.com/d3d-pipeline>
The Computer Graphics Museum <http://computergraphicsmuseum.org>
The Terminals Wiki <http://terminals.classiccmp.org>
Legalize Adulthood! (my blog) <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>

[j...@arcade.demon.co.uk]

Wendell wrote:
> I wanted to learn PDP-11 assembly, so I searched for all the books I

Welcome!

> Frank. 1983. Introduction to the PDP-11 and Its Assembly Language.

> Kapps. 1987. Assembly Language for the PDP-11, 2e. 438p

Those are the two I have just above me on my shelf just here.
Frank was particulary useful when I was writing my PDP11
emulator.

jgh - mdfs.net

[Joseph Ambrose]

Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p

I can recommend this book because I had the author as a prof during my days as an undergrad at SUNY Oswego (76-80) He was the CS dept. chair at the time..

His VAX assembler book is also well done.



On Tuesday, July 17, 2012 8:41:18 AM UTC-4, Bill Gunshannon wrote:

>
> Wendell writes:
>
> > I wanted to learn PDP-11 assembly, so I searched for all the books I
>
> > could find. To help anyone else, here they are. They fall into two
>
> > groups, 1) intro to machine architecture with PDP-11 for a CS3 type
>
> > course, and 2) short intros to assembly assuming you are already
>
> > familiar with the machine. I have included links to reviews when I
>
> > found them.
>
> >
>
> .....
>
> >
>
> > Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p.
>
> >
>
> ....
>
> >
>
> > Sowell. 1984. Programming in Assembly Language: Macro-11. 492p.
>
> > http://www.computingreviews.com/review/review_review.cfm?review_id=111714
>
> >
>
>
>
> I have these two and they are both great. I use them as references even
>
> now. They are never put away. I am sure I have others, but these are,
>
> by far, my favorites.
>
>
>
> bill
>
>
>
> --
>
> Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves
>

[Jerome H. Fine]

>Joseph Ambrose wrote:

>Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p
>
>I can recommend this book because I had the author as a prof during my days as an undergrad at SUNY Oswego (76-80) He was the CS dept. chair at the time..
>
>His VAX assembler book is also well done.
>

I suggest that if you want to understand how to write
PDP-11 code under any of the PDP-11 operating
systems, one of the more helpful methods is to read
and understand the code written by DEC for that
operating system.

For example, under RT-11, the files used to build
the operating system, the device drivers and the
utilities contain almost countless examples of very
experienced software system designers, probably
too many examples for most individuals to ever
read in their entire lives. I have been working with
RT-11 for more than 30 years and I still have not
even looked at more than about half the total code
used to produce any given RT-11 binary distribution.
By the way, the total size of all of the commented
source code files required to produce an RT-11
binary distribution is approximately 25 MB. So there
is a lot to read.

I suspect that if you are more interested in either RSTS/E
or RSX-11 and can locate the source code files used
to produce those operating systems, that will well serve
anyone who wants to learn PDP-11 assembly language.

While I agree that formal books such as the example
by Sebesta are also essential if someone wants a
full understanding of code used in mathematical
operations - which differ in their basic intent from
operating system code, as an excellent starting point,
operating system code provides great examples.

On the other hand, if FORTRAN is your primary
language, then there is really very little about the
PDP-11 that is different from FORTRAN run on
similar systems. Since the address range is limited
to 64 KBytes, large programs will require overlays
that are no longer needed with most 32 bit address
hardware.

But the question was about assembly language, so
the use of operating system, device drivers and
utilities is probably still a great source of examples.

If anyone has any additional questions, please ask.

Jerome Fine

[Bob Eager]

On Tue, 19 Feb 2013 09:46:35 -0500, Jerome H. Fine wrote:

> >Joseph Ambrose wrote:
>
>>Sebesta. 1985. PDP-11: Structured Assembly Language Programming. 432p
>>
>>I can recommend this book because I had the author as a prof during my
>>days as an undergrad at SUNY Oswego (76-80) He was the CS dept. chair at
>>the time..
>>
>>His VAX assembler book is also well done.
>>
> I suggest that if you want to understand how to write PDP-11 code under
> any of the PDP-11 operating systems, one of the more helpful methods is
> to read and understand the code written by DEC for that operating
> system.

I learned most of my PDP-11 assembler programming tricks from reading the
source code of the RT-11 (SJ and FB) monitors back in 1975. The FB
monitor was notable for the apposite literary quotes, I remember...



--
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*lightning surge protection* - a w_tom conductor

[bi...@mix.com]

Bob Eager <news...@eager.cx> writes:

> I learned most of my PDP-11 assembler programming tricks from reading the
> source code of the RT-11 (SJ and FB) monitors back in 1975. The FB
> monitor was notable for the apposite literary quotes, I remember...

I worked hard to comment Kermit for RT-11 to make it easily understood
by anyone who might read through it later. The job's not finished until
the documentation is done, heh.. It contains more than a few programming
tricks, as well (see my sig for one). Sources are here -

ftp://kermit.columbia.edu/kermit/rt11/

Billy Y..
--
sub #'9+1 ,r0 ; convert ascii byte
add #9.+1 ,r0 ; to an integer
bcc 20$ ; not a number

[bi...@mix.com]

> Sources are here -
>
> ftp://kermit.columbia.edu/kermit/rt11/

I received an inquiry about this via email -

| I did notice that there is a message that at least some
| of the files are still protected by copyright.
|
| While I agree that there is almost zero possibility of
| anyone taking any action on such old source code files,
| I am still a bit curious as to how it seems OK to have
| these files available for unrestricted download while
| they are still under copyright protection.

From http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/kermit.html -

# Effective 1 July 2011 [...] All Kermit software has been
# given an Open Source license.

As well, I obtained Brian Nelson's permission before making any
of my own work available. I think it would have been quite rude
to not have done that, regardless of any copyright...

| How does that mange to not void the copyright?

At least in the USA it's not a matter of voiding anything,
but it is possible to infringe on someone's rights. Here,
however, that is no longer (even if it ever was) possible.

[jgharston]

bi wrote:
> | How does that mange to not void the copyright?
>
> At least in the USA it's not a matter of voiding anything,
> but it is possible to infringe on someone's rights.  Here,
> however, that is no longer (even if it ever was) possible.

Copyright does not in of itself mean something cannot be copied.
Copyright purely and simply gives the copyright holder the right to
dictate terms. The copyright holder is perfectly free to dictate terms
of "you may freely use this, you don't need to ask for permission,
stop pestering me".

JGH