Visual bB 1.0 - a new IDE for batari Basic

[iesposta]

I do LOTS of Atari 2600 development on my iPad!

I VNC into my iMac with VMWare running Win 7 and VbB.

I have designed sprites, typed code, compile .bas files, copy .bin files to the iMac and then drag them to the mounted iPad where I test them on the iPad with 2600.emu (Stella).

[ultima]

hello i was trying build 558, windows on checking for a fragmented disc at power-up time wiped out all of my files from games added while in the 558 environment but left the earlier files from 554 alone..

[jwierer]

This is unrelated to Visual bB. Sounds like you have a failing disk or at least a bad portion on your hard disk.

1. Open Computer by clicking the Start button , and then clicking Computer.
   
2. Right-click the hard disk drive that you want to check, and then click Properties.
   
3. Click the Tools tab, and then, under Error-checking, click Check Now. If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.
   To automatically repair problems with files and folders that the scan detects, select Automatically fix file system errors. Otherwise, the disk check will simply report problems but not fix them.
   To perform a thorough disk check, select Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors. This scan attempts to find and repair physical errors on the hard disk itself, and it can take much longer to complete.
   To check for both file errors and physical errors, select both Automatically fix file system errors and Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors.
   
4. Click Start.
   

You have to love Windows.

 

-Jeff

[ultima]

thanks no problems with the drive now but it looks like my work was unrecoverable.

[Ninjinister]

Okay, I got everything up and running on my computer. But after I tried to run my program, it told me that it couldn't find default.bas.bin. I've tried everything that I can think of but nothing seems to work. HELP!

Sorry to follow up on this super old issue, but I'm having the same problem. This only occurs on new projects; anything I open that was made by anyone else works flawlessly. I have verified that there are no spaces. Are there any known solutions?

[+Gemintronic]

Sorry to follow up on this super old issue, but I'm having the same problem. This only occurs on new projects; anything I open that was made by anyone else works flawlessly. I have verified that there are no spaces. Are there any known solutions?

 

I've found that sometimes my project folder is actually two deep. As in: C:\BatariBASIC\Projects\Bopha\Bopha

 

I'd maybe check to see if that's happening by manually going in the Windows Explorer and checking out the folder structure.

[Ninjinister]

 

I've found that sometimes my project folder is actually two deep. As in: C:\BatariBASIC\Projects\Bopha\Bopha

 

I'd maybe check to see if that's happening by manually going in the Windows Explorer and checking out the folder structure.

I'll give that a try when I get home. Thanks.

 

I don't think it's too bad, though. I've got it under C:\Atari2600dev\(project name)

Edited September 27, 2013 by Ninjinister

[jwierer]

I'll give that a try when I get home. Thanks.

 

I don't think it's too bad, though. I've got it under C:\Atari2600dev\(project name)

The most common source of this, is the code didn't actually compile to create a bin. I also think the default .bat file that comes with bB was problematic with spaces if your project has names. Download the alternate one in post #1.

[Ninjinister]

The most common source of this, is the code didn't actually compile to create a bin. I also think the default .bat file that comes with bB was problematic with spaces if your project has names. Download the alternate one in post #1.

Would that be the file called "2600bas.zip"? I tried that and it didn't work. My folder also isn't super deep, either, just C:\2600dev\StoneSmash and StreetRash for my two projects.

 

I apologize if I'm being completely obtuse about this. I have a history of missing details when others explain things.

[jwierer]

Does the code actually compile from the command line?

[+Random Terrain]

Would that be the file called "2600bas.zip"? I tried that and it didn't work. My folder also isn't super deep, either, just C:\2600dev\StoneSmash and StreetRash for my two projects.

 

I apologize if I'm being completely obtuse about this. I have a history of missing details when others explain things.

 

Before you guys get too far off the freeway, what version of batari Basic are you using? You should be using this if you're not already:

 

atariage.com/forums/topic/214909-bb-with-native-64k-cart-support-11dreveng/

 

Just remember to move sed.exe from the sed folder to the main bB folder.

[Ninjinister]

 

Before you guys get too far off the freeway, what version of batari Basic are you using? You should be using this if you're not already:

 

atariage.com/forums/topic/214909-bb-with-native-64k-cart-support-11dreveng/

 

Just remember to move sed.exe from the sed folder to the main bB folder.

 

I have

*Visual bB 1.0, build 554

*bB with native 64k cart support, 1.1.d.reveng (SED.EXE moved to main bB folder)

*2600bas.zip downloaded from first post in this topic

*Windows 7 64-bit zip from first post

[+Random Terrain]

I have

*Visual bB 1.0, build 554

*bB with native 64k cart support, 1.1.d.reveng (SED.EXE moved to main bB folder)

*2600bas.zip downloaded from first post in this topic

*Windows 7 64-bit zip from first post

 

I'd download bB.1.1d.reveng22.zip (SED.EXE moved to main bB folder) and forget about the last two. See if that works with Visual batari Basic as-is.

[jwierer]

If it were me, I would confirm bB is compiling from the command line first. If the code has an error, it doesn't matter what version you're using.

[Ninjinister]

Oh so it could be an error in my coding? Interesting. I'll take a look at it, as well as look into RT's solution.

 

I appreciate you folks being so patient with me.

[SeaGtGruff]

Is there any way to get VisualbB to work with file paths that contain spaces? Sure, I could reinstall everything in directories that contain no spaces in their names. But this is an issue that comes up a lot whenever new people install batari Basic and VisualbB. I can get Crimson Editor to work with spaces, and I can even get 2600bas.bat to work with spaces from a command prompt, but no matter what I do, I can't get VisualbB to work with spaces-- it isn't even finding the alternate batch file, it just says compilation completed successfully yet there's no bin file. So I'm thinking there's something in the way VisualbB is handling the path variables (compiler path and alternate batch path) that isn't quite right if the path contains spaces. I'm willing to help in whatever capacity I can to figure this out.

 

If it matters, I'm using bb1.1d26, the latest beta VisualbB from the blog, 64-bit Windows 8.1, and I made the registry changes to add Wow6432node in the appropriate places.

 

In case anyone's interested, I'm attaching the modified 2600bas.bat file that I'm using, which works perfectly from the command prompt.

 

If you're currently in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\batari Basic" directory, use this command line (look Ma, no quotes in the command line!):

 

2600bas.bat C:\Program Files (x86)\batari Basic\projects\VbB test\VbB test.bas

 

If you're *not* in the batari Basic directory, you need to include the path with 2600bas.bat and enclose it in quotes (but not the rest of the command line):

 

"C:\Program Files (x86)\batari Basic\2600bas.bat" C:\Program Files (x86)\batari Basic\projects\VbB test\VbB test.bas

 

(It goes without saying that you'll need to modify those paths and the bB file name as needed depending on your installation and the name of the bB program you're trying to compile.)

 

Edit: The trick to getting the batch to accept everything after the 2600bas.bat command as a single parameter was to use %* instead of %1, and then I also had to put quotes around everything that might contain a file path with spaces in it.

 

Edit #2: I just realized that the batch contains %2 if the optimizer is being used, which might be a problem, since %* gets everything but %2 will be whatever's after the second space (i.e., "Files")-- although turning off the optimization option in VisualbB didn't make any difference.

2600bas.zip

Edited November 25, 2013 by SeaGtGruff

[jwierer]

I think the problem has to do with launching command processes that use environment variables. In this case I think Win32 only works with short path names. What I can do is just force short names everytime - I can test this over the holiday. As a workaround though, try unchecking the options for add bB Environment Variable and bB Compiler to system Path. This will prevent from vbB from setting them using their long names. Set bB and Path manually as per the bB readme, but use the short names. If you don't know how to get these you can browse to your bB folder via commandline and run

 for %I in (.) do echo %~sI

This will give you the old dos 8.3 name. With the shorter names I believe it should work.

 

EDIT - looks like this really only applies to the bB environment variable. That seems where it complains a file is not found even if wrapped in quotes. Must be a legacy Windows thing that never got changed for long file names. I've confirmed though that forcing short names fixes the problem. I'll include this in a future build. I have a backlog of things to fix up including support for the latest kernel additions from RevEng.

 

-Jeff

[SeaGtGruff]

I don't think it's a Win32 thing per se, since I'm using 64-bit Windows 8.1 and I can get it to work (using my modified batch file) from a command prompt. Spaces are the problem, and it isn't unique to Windows, since any program that's launched from a command line and allows for parameters included in the command line is going to have trouble with spaces inside the parameters. Using quotes usually helps resolves that issue, but the only way to get the batch to accept a parameter with spaces in it was to change %1 to %*-- although that means the optimizing option won't be usable with my modified batch (not that I ever used that option).

 

It's no big deal-- I can always reinstall everything in directories that don't have spaces in them, which is how I have my other (older) computer set up. But when I was installing everything on my new computer I decided to install in the "Program Files (x86)" directory. And since this issue of spaces seems to come up whenever a new person decides to install batari Basic and try their hand at making Atari 2600 games, I thought it would be great if we could figure out how to make everything work with spaces.

[jwierer]

I can get it to work from the commandline as well, but not when launched programmatically. I launch the compiler as a background process and capture the output for displayu. When I do that, it seems to break using environment variables that have spaces, though using the 8.3 format seems to work fine. Here seems to be a number of threads on the StackOverflow which is where I stumbled across a solution.

 

-Jeff

[RevEng]

Edit: The trick to getting the batch to accept everything after the 2600bas.bat command as a single parameter was to use %* instead of %1, and then I also had to put quotes around everything that might contain a file path with spaces in it.

 

Edit #2: I just realized that the batch contains %2 if the optimizer is being used, which might be a problem, since %* gets everything but %2 will be whatever's after the second space (i.e., "Files")-- although turning off the optimization option in VisualbB didn't make any difference.

 

I played around for a bit, and was able to get a version that worked from CLI with and without "-O". It uses "%~f1" for the arguments, instead of "%*".

 

Still no joy from vbb, but that's expected, given Jeff's comments.

 

2600bas.zip

 

 

And since this issue of spaces seems to come up whenever a new person decides to install batari Basic and try their hand at making Atari 2600 games, I thought it would be great if we could figure out how to make everything work with spaces.

Totally agree. Lets put our collective heads together and figure it out.

[+Gemintronic]

I wonder if this would be an opportune time to consider shifting to mono

http://www.mono-project.com/Main_Page

 

It may solve the file system issues and certainly make a Linux or Mac version of VisualbB easier.

[SeaGtGruff]

RevEng, thanks for the modification of the modified batch file! I had only just found out about %*, now I have to go look up %~! One thing I'm not sure of is whether %* and %~ work in Unix and other non-MS operating systems. We'll want a solution that works for everyone.

 

Edit: Which means I probably shouldn't have changed the forward slashes to backslashes.

Edited November 27, 2013 by SeaGtGruff

[SeaGtGruff]

theloon, Mono looks interesting!

[RevEng]

RevEng, thanks for the modification of the modified batch file! I had only just found out about %*, now I have to go look up %~! One thing I'm not sure of is whether %* and %~ work in Unix and other non-MS operating systems. We'll want a solution that works for everyone.

 

Edit: Which means I probably shouldn't have changed the forward slashes to backslashes.

 

No problem!

 

The batch files and the "%" argument thing is strictly Microsoft, so by its nature its not portable. But I rewrote the Unix 2600basic.sh script to deal with spaces a few releases back, so we're good there.

[SeaGtGruff]

Hmm, I thought Unix used % too, but I see it uses $ instead. (It's been over a decade since I've used Unix.) I haven't looked to see what Apple or Android use.