aap.pdp6/README.md

PDP-6 Simulator

This project is an attempt to simulate the PDP-6 computer with front panel and blinkenlights on the logic level. The maintenance manual has flow charts, schematics and explanations: Volume1 Volume2

More recently I've been working on a verilog simulation that I want to put on an FPGA eventually.

Code

The code is more or less a transcription of the schematics into C. This means you will not understand it unless you're familiar with the maintenance manual. Pulses are represented as functions, when a pulse triggers another pulse it does so by the nextpulse function which adds a pulse to the list of next pulses. In the main cpu loop the list of current pulses is iterated and each pulse is called, then (after checking some external signals) the current and next pulse lists are swapped and the process begins anew. The timing was not accurately modeled and there is room for improvement. Due to the inexact timing the hardware connections (through the memory and IO bus) were not implemented too accurately. This may change in the future.

Building

The supplied makefile assumes gcc (there are flags to silence some stupid warnings). Otherwise you need SDL and pthread.

Running

The cpu (apr), console tty and paper tape/punch are implemented. There are no other external devices yet. The only things missing from the cpu is the repeat key mechanism.

File tree

• emu source for the emulator
• verilog source for the verilog simulation
• art everything graphical
• code some test code for the PDP-6
• tools tools like an assembler and linker
• misc some misc. and old stuff

To do

• repeat and maint. switches
• test thoroughly!
• devices
• timing