(gasp.info.gz) Overview

 
 What is GASP?
 *************
 
    The primary purpose of the GNU assembler is to assemble the output of
 other programs--notably compilers.  When you have to hand-code
 specialized routines in assembly, that means the GNU assembler is an
 unfriendly processor: it has no directives for macros, conditionals, or
 many other conveniences that you might expect.
 
    In some cases you can simply use the C preprocessor, or a generalized
 preprocessor like M4; but this can be awkward, since none of these
 things are designed with assembly in mind.
 
    GASP fills this need.  It is expressly designed to provide the
 facilities you need with hand-coded assembly code.  Implementing it as a
 preprocessor, rather than part of the assembler, allows the maximum
 flexibility: you can use it with hand-coded assembly, without paying a
 penalty of added complexity in the assembler you use for compiler
 output.
 
    Here is a small example to give the flavor of GASP.  This input to
 GASP
 
              .MACRO  saveregs from=8 to=14
      count   .ASSIGNA \from
              ! save r\from..r\to
              .AWHILE  \&count LE \to
              mov     r\&count,@-sp
      count   .ASSIGNA  \&count + 1
              .AENDW
              .ENDM
      
              saveregs from=12
      
      bar:    mov     #H'dead+10,r0
      foo     .SDATAC "hello"<10>
              .END
 
 generates this assembly program:
 
              ! save r12..r14
              mov     r12,@-sp
              mov     r13,@-sp
              mov     r14,@-sp
      
      bar:    mov     #57005+10,r0
      foo:    .byte   6,104,101,108,108,111,10
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