6502 Debugger

These are the commands that the debugger CLI supports. Due to the asynchronous nature of the debugger and emulator, commands can be run even while the emulator is actively executing the program. For instance, try running the disco.asm example and typing set A #$0 into the debugger while it’s running with a screen attached, you will be able to modify the program in real time!

Or, run the emulator on an empty file, and run set $200 #$FF to write to the frame buffer. You can even draw a picture by hand using just the debugger!

The GUI debugger actually just sends commands like these to the emulator using a message queue, and you can do the same. Look in /dev/mqueue for the message queue the emulator is using, and try sending a debug command as a null-terminated string to the queue, you should be able to interact with the emulator from a different process in real time.

step, s

Step through one CPU instruction

show [$addr], print [$addr]

Show the value at $addr in memory, or, if no address given, show value of all registers.

set $addr #$val, set reg #$val

Set either $addr or register reg to #$val.

run

Run the emulator.

pause

Stop running the emulator.

quit, exit

Quit the debugger, emulator, and the screen (if running).