ARMAssem for Mobile App Development

ARMAssem is a Christian outreach app. It aims to spread the good news message of Jesus Christ while providing an application that may find useful or educational.

Most mobile devices run on some kind of ARM processor. As the ARM processors use RISC (reduced instruction set) architecture, they are relatively easy to learn. This app allows you to write ARM-like assembly language to create a basic app or game. There is no need to understand anything about the hardware of the device, as an API is provided to set the colour, draw lines, rectangles, text and handle taps and swipes.

As the translation from the assembly language is a relatively simple process, the assembler runs quite fast. For simple apps, expect around 5-10 seconds for the first assemble after loading. Then after each code change expect around 1-2 seconds for each assemble. This is because each code change only requires doing the assemble for the module that changed.

ARMAssem comes preloaded with a sample assembly language program. The sample shows how you can make a sprite plus palette editor using the Android API. The idea is that you can edit the sample program, see the results of your changes and get started learning assembly very quickly.

Features:

32-bit registers and memory locations

Syntax highlighting to show labels and strings

Define separate data and code sections

Define integer or string variables

Define labels for variables and branch locations

Create and navigate multiple files

Label navigation to support jumping around the code

Autocomplete to support auto typing of labels

Comments using semi-colon to explain code

Debugger:

Allows you to run step by step, seeing registers and memory change

Shows current registers R0-R15

Shows current memory locations M0-M200

Ability to see app running on the same screen as the debugger, this makes it easy to learn assembly language

Ability to set break points to step over sections

Ability to step frame by frame

Supported Instructions:

MOV,CMP,B,BEQ,BNE,BGT,BLT,BGE,BLE

MOVEQ,MOVNE,MOVGT,MOVLE

LDR - preindexed, postindexed, offset

STR - preindexed, postindexed, offset

ADD,SUB,PUSH,POP

Extra Instructions:

These are instructions to support graphics and object oriented style which

are not part of the ARM assembly instruction set.

RECT - draw a rectangle top left R1,R2 to bottom right R3,R4

LINE - draw a line from position R1,R2 to R3,R4

TEXT - draw text of string R1 at position R2,R3

COLOR - change the current color (0-9) using R1

COLORRGB - change the current color (red, green, blue) using R1,R2,R3

TOUCH - get the tap up or down event into R1,R2,R3

SWIPE - get the finger position into R1 and R2

NEW object - create a new instance of the object, return pointer in R1

CALL - call the object, using pointer in R1

RTS - return to the caller

Note all instructions currently only work on 32-bit numbers,

there are no byte level or half-word level operations.

Strings are encoded as sequences of 32-bit numbers.

Shortcuts:

All shortcuts are followed by a single digit then space,

or two digits.

m - types MOV register,

l - types LDR register,

t - types STR register,

p - types PUSH {register}

o - types POP {register}

a - types ADD register,

s - types SUB register,

Compatibility:

Older and newer devices are supported

Resize option available to fit any size screen (with loss of resolution for smaller screens)