Table of Contents

1. Compiling and degubbing code for Tiva
2. Hardware Abstraction Layer
3. Debugging, heap, and display
4. Analog Digital Converter and Timers
5. Playing Nokia Tunes
6. Random Number Generator, Rendering Engine, and the Game
7. A real-time operating system

Random Number Generator

To make the game more engaging, we introduce some randomness into it. We don't need anything cryptographically secure, so a Linear Congruential Generator will do just fine. We count the time from the start-up in millisecond-long jiffies and wait for a first button press to select the seed.

 1void button_event(IO_io *io, uint16_t event)
 2{
 3  uint64_t btn;
 4  IO_get(io, &btn);
 5  if(btn)
 6    button_value = 1;
 7
 8  if(!rng_initialized) {
 9    rng_initialized = 1;
10    IO_rng_seed(IO_time());
11  }
12}

Rendering Engine

The rendering engine takes a scene descriptor, a display device, and a timer. Based on this information it computes new positions of objects, draws them on the screen if necessary and checks for collisions.

 1struct SI_scene {
 2  SI_object **objects;
 3  void      (*pre_render)(struct SI_scene *);
 4  void      (*collision)(SI_object *obj1, SI_object *obj2);
 5  uint8_t     fps;
 6  uint8_t     num_objects;
 7  uint8_t     flags;
 8};
 9
10void SI_scene_render(SI_scene *scene, IO_io *display, IO_io *timer);

Each SI_scene holds a list of "polymorphic" objects that should be rendered, a pointer to a pre_render function that calculates a new position of each object, and a pointer to a collision callback that is invoked when the scene renderer detects an overlap between two objects. The SI_scene_render function runs after every interrupt:

1  while(1) {
2    SI_scene_render(&scenes[current_scene].scene, &display, &scene_timer);
3    IO_wait_for_interrupt();
4  }

Whether it gets executed or not, depends on the flag parameter of the scene. If it's set to SI_SCENE_IGNORE, the renderer returns immediately. On the other hand, if it's set to SI_SCENE_RENDER, the renderer calls the pre_render callback, draws the objects on the screen, and computes the object overlaps notifying the collision callback if necessary. After each frame, the scene is disabled (SI_SCENE_IGNORE). It is re-enabled by the timer interrupt in a time quantum that depends on the fps parameter.

See SI_scene.h and SI_scene.c.

Each object has a draw function that enables the renderer to draw it on the screen. There are three types of objects: a generic object, a bitmap object, and a text object:

 1struct SI_object {
 2  uint16_t x;
 3  uint16_t y;
 4  uint16_t width;
 5  uint16_t height;
 6  uint8_t  flags;
 7  uint8_t  user_flags;
 8  void (*draw)(struct SI_object *this, IO_io *display);
 9};
10
11struct SI_object_bitmap {
12  SI_object        obj;
13  const IO_bitmap *bmp;
14};
15
16struct SI_object_text {
17  SI_object      obj;
18  const char    *text;
19  const IO_font *font;
20};

The object array in the scene is initialized with the SI_object pointers:

1static SI_object         score_obj;
2static SI_object_bitmap  invader_obj[5];
3scene->objects[1] = &score_obj;
4scene->objects[i+5] = &invader_obj[i].obj;

See SI_scene_game.c.

The renderer calls the draw function of each SI_OBJECT_VISIBLE object:

1obj->draw(obj, display);

Finally, each draw method uses the CONTAINER_OF macro to compute the pointer to the actual object of concrete type:

 1#define CONTAINER_OF(TYPE, MEMBER, MEMBER_ADDR) \
 2  ((TYPE *) ( (char *)MEMBER_ADDR - offsetof(TYPE, MEMBER)))
 3
 4void SI_object_bitmap_draw(SI_object *obj, IO_io *display)
 5{
 6  SI_object_bitmap *this = CONTAINER_OF(SI_object_bitmap, obj, obj);
 7  IO_display_print_bitmap(display, obj->x, obj->y, this->bmp);
 8}
 9
10void SI_object_text_draw(SI_object *obj, IO_io *display)
11{
12  SI_object_text *this = CONTAINER_OF(SI_object_text, obj, obj);
13  IO_display_set_font(display, this->font);
14  IO_display_cursor_goto(display, obj->x, obj->y);
15  IO_print(display, "%s", this->text);
16}

The Game

All this seems to work pretty well when put together:

See silly-invaders.c.