Short:	  PhxAss V4.18 68xxx Macro Assembler
Uploader: juergen@gator.teuto.de  Juergen Stiekel)
Author:   frank@phoenix.owl.de (Frank Wille, Phoenix/Phantasm)
Type:	  dev/asm

This archive contains the Assembler PhxAss V4.18 and the Linker
PhxLnk V4.17.

*** PHXASS ***
PhxAss V4.18 is a highly optimizing macro assembler for Motorola's 680x0
CPUs, 6888x FPUs and 68851 MMU (of course, the 030, 040 and 060 MMUs are
also supported). It requires OS2.04 (V37) and 1 MB RAM as minimum.

Most important features:
o Fast: 15000-30000 lines per minute with standard Amigas, 50000-350000
  with A4000/040.
o Resident.
o Symbolic and Source Level Debugging.
o Automatic generation of executables (if possible).
o Creates relocatable Amiga-DOS objects or absolute code (written into
  a file (raw or Motorola S-Format), into memory or directly onto disk).
o Small Code and Small Data support (also support for __MERGED sections).
o Listing file, Cross Reference Listing, Equates file.
o Complete floating point support: You may use complex floating point
  expressions, including float functions (sine, logarithm, square root,
  power, etc.), everywhere in your source, e.g. defining float EQUates or
  SETs.
o Switches for nine different optimizations.
o Locale symbols (xxx$ and .xxx type).
o Up to 36 macro parameters.
o Support for Motorola's old and new operand style (even in 68000 mode).
o locale.library usage (english, german, swedish, italian, danish and
  french ).
o Nearly all directives of the most popular assemblers like Seka, DevPac or
  AS (Aztec) are supported. Example: INCBIN, INCDIR, CODE_C, REPT, RS,
  RSRESET, EQUR, REG, OFFSET, XDEF, XREF, PUBLIC, ...
o Further development and support is guaranteed for years, because I'll
  *never* change my system (Amiga forever!).
o Finally: Although Shareware, there are no disabled functions in PhxAss!

You will find four different versions of PhxAss in this distribution:
1. PhxAss: The standard 680x0,FPU,MMU macro assembler.
2. SmallPhxAss: This is a 68000-only version without floating point support.
3. FreePhxAss: This program is FREEWARE! It is intended for developers of
    PD-Compilers, who want to include PhxAss in their compiler package.
4. GigaPhxAss: Identical to PhxAss, but source codes are not limited to
    65535 lines. Quite useful for assembling huge Reassembler outputs.

CHANGES SINCE PHXASS V4.15 (last Aminet release):
Fixed Bugs:
o As a result of improvements in V4.15, the OPT-parameter didn't work. :(
o MOVE16 didn't work with absolute addresses less than $8000.
New Features:
o New CLI-Parameter "RC=ERRCODE/K/N" for defining the return code in case
  of an error.
o MOVEQ #x,Dn with 128<x<255 will force PhxAss to display a warning,
  which can be disabled by the new NOWARN/S option.
o Increased the number of possible macro parameters. Now there are 36
  parameters possible! (\\0 - \\9 and \\a - \\z)
o Increased the buffer sizes from 512 to 1024 bytes.
o French catalog.


*** PHXLNK ***
PhxLnk is FREEWARE and supports all features of a standard Amiga-DOS linker
(like BLink), except of overlay hunks and automatic link vectors (ALV).

Implemented functions:
o Links object files and libraries (SAS/C extended libraries too)
o Sections can be forced to Chip-memory
o Small Code, Small Data
o SAS/C-Blink Small Data compatibility available
o '_MERGED' sections are recognized automatically (and coalesced like
  Small Data sections)
o Symbolic and Source Level Debugging (PowerVisor compatibility included)
o Debug blocks are removed on request
o Deletes empty sections
o Zero bytes at the end of a section will be deleted and appear in the
  HUNK_HEADER block only
o User may define absolute external symbols
o Generates HUNK_RELOC32SHORT blocks by default

CHANGES SINCE PHXLNK V4.15 (last Aminet release):
o Partial support for SLink (SAS/C). PhxLnk defines ___ctors and
  ___dtors as NULL to avoid errors during linking. Complete SLink-
  support may follow in a later release. (if somebody needs it :-)
o Fixing the bug with __MERGED sections in V4.10 generated a new one in
  the 'normal' small data mode.
o The shortening of sections, as introduced in V4.00, didn't work very
  well.