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Review
Review by  Steven Ford
Reviewed on 2006-03-25
Note! This review was written for a previous version of this file!

I decided to download "SquirrelBox" after seeing the reviews. It was great. Although not a complete programming language, it is an absolute alternative to all-out assembly programming. The download only comes with basic functions, but writing new ones is easy. I must honestly say that if you have knowledge of assembly, but think it is too tedious to write programs in it, you should download this. Writing macros (functions) is very easy and effective. If you don't know any assembly, and are looking for an alternative to ASM, I would not recommend this to you, but if ASM is just too tedious, this will work great.


Review
Review by  scott delaney
Reviewed on 2006-02-17
Note! This review was written for a previous version of this file!

"SquirrelBox" is a high level programming language that produces (quality) z80 source. The "high level" is not for beginners, I have to say. It is a mix between C, and Java. So, it is definitely easier than learning 100% pure ASM, but you should have some programming knowledge before downloading this.

This zip comes with detailed tutorials that are easy to understand, and are much more easy to understand than ASM. Even if you end up learning ASM or some other language after this, you will still benefit, because the tutorials have things that refer to programing in general. It was slighty difficult to learn at first, but once I got the hang of it, I might not even bother trying to learn ASM anymore.

You do need Java to use "SquirrelBox", but that shouldn't be a problem. An ASM tool like this has never been so complete or accurate as far as I know: a must download for mildly experienced programmers.


Review
Review by  Gergely Patai
Reviewed on 2005-06-01
Note! This review was written for a previous version of this file!

“SquirrelBox” is intended to be a compiler for the high-level “Antidisassemblage” language. It seemed to be an interesting project for me to try, as I've never seen quality Z80 code generated from high-level languages. There are some macro-based languages available from ticalc.org, but they are all rather limited in expressiveness. Since this project is in an early state, I didn't expect fast code, only code that works.

My first experience was appalling. The compiler couldn't handle the simplest constructs that were said to be part of the language according to the tutorial. Even if it could actually parse the source without errors, it generated erroneous and often simply invalid Z80 code containing nonexistent instructions. After a bit of quarrel in the comments related to the news item there were several bugfixes made. However, the program is still in a state where it can't handle simple assignments, let alone other features of the language. It can't be used to do anything apart from compiling the examples, and even those outputs contain errors.

I seriously hope someone is willing to continue this project, although a rewrite of some components could be beneficial.


Review
Review by  jordan wimberly
Reviewed on 2005-05-02
Note! This review was written for a previous version of this file!

“Antidisassemblage” is a truly impressive piece of work. This language blends ASM and BASIC together with almost no flaws. The user interface is extremely easy to use and compiles code into z80 source perfectly. This .zip includes everything you need to make full fledged programs, including “TASM” and “Devpac”. It also includes very descriptive readme's and a tutorial archive.

It language can easily replace basic in my opinion, and I am going to start using it instead of basic. To describe it in one word: wow.

It gets a well deserved 10/10.


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