Tell the person where it hurts

A fault stopped the machine and printed a line to standard error. On a terminal
that is a diagnosis. Behind a window it is a frozen picture and no reason at
all, because the message went somewhere nobody was looking - the machine looked
hung and was not. It had stopped, and said so invisibly.

CosmOS catches all five faults now and says what happened on the screen, with
the address, in red.

A FAULT ENDS THE PROGRAM, NOT THE MACHINE. That is the answer to "carry on or
start again", and it is not a compromise: a bare RETI from most of these meets
the instruction that failed and fails again, so carrying on was never on offer.
But the machine is almost never what is broken. Everything the shell puts back
when a program exits - the Stack, its vectors, the drive, the working directory,
the console, the screen - is exactly what wants putting back after one dies, so
the handler sets a status and joins handleExit. You are back at the prompt, and
the program is recorded as having STOPPED rather than finished, because saying
"finished" under a red fault message would be the shell contradicting itself.

A fault below where programs load is the system's own, and there is nothing to
go back to. That one says so and stops.

THE SCREEN GOES BACK TO A MODE TEXT CAN BE SEEN IN, and that is the part that
matters rather than the part that is prettiest. A program that faulted in bitmap
mode left the console with no text rows, so it draws nothing at all: the message
would be perfectly correct and completely invisible, which is the one thing it
must never be. Two palette entries go back for the same reason, since a program
that wrote its own colours can leave every ink the same as every paper. Only the
two the message needs, so the rest of what the program chose is left alone.

Both halves are checked by looking at the PICTURE, because the serial line was
never where the problem was. Crash blind ruins the palette and drops into bitmap
mode before it faults; without the mode the screen comes back 320 by 200 with
nothing on it, and without the palette it is the right size with the message
present and unreadable. Each break loses the red on its own.

Crash is also a program worth having: it breaks in whichever of the five ways
you name, so a fault screen can be looked at without having written a bug first.

Two things found on the way:

The native assembler keeps its OWN copy of the reserved vector names, so it did
not know NoHandler or NoDevice and built a cosmos.bin that differed from the
host assembler's. Caught by native.sh, which is exactly the drift that test
exists for.

And cosmosMonitor had dead input. It assembles code into 0x8000 and runs it, and
that code faults - which used to kill the machine, so everything after it in the
file had never run. It runs now, and the recording grew by sixty lines of
monitor session that had been unreachable since the day the fault was put there.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01E2JrLzFvuFX9fgi1LDRjrW
This commit is contained in:
Anachronaut
2026-09-01 15:08:20 -04:00
co-authored by Claude Opus 5
parent 000a6d39cb
commit fd9c4c75f8
19 changed files with 931 additions and 10 deletions
+145
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@@ -0,0 +1,145 @@
; Breaks on purpose, in whichever of the four ways it is asked for.
;
; Every one of these used to stop the machine and print a line to a standard error that
; nobody behind a window is looking at, so the machine appeared to hang. The system catches
; all of them now and says what happened and where, and this is what says so - and what a
; person can run when they want to see the fault screen without having written a bug first.
;
; Crash opcode a byte in the middle of the code that does not decode
; Crash service a SWI naming a service the system does not implement
; Crash bank a transfer out of a bank that has nothing registered in it
; Crash device asking the console to interrupt, with no handler installed
; Crash blind the same bad byte, but from a screen with nowhere to print at all
;
; The last one is the odd one: it is not something this program does wrong, it is something
; it fails to have done. The interrupt arrives from outside once the console has anything to
; say, and with no input it is the END of input that arrives.
;
; Written by Anachronaut
#Include services.asm
#Program
#Base 0x4000
start:
SETD.0 Argument
INIB 0d15
SWI osArgument
SETD.0 Argument
SETD.1 WordOpcode
CALL textSame
BRQ crashOpcode
SETD.0 Argument
SETD.1 WordService
CALL textSame
BRQ crashService
SETD.0 Argument
SETD.1 WordBank
CALL textSame
BRQ crashBank
SETD.0 Argument
SETD.1 WordDevice
CALL textSame
BRQ crashDevice
SETD.0 Argument
SETD.1 WordBlind
CALL textSame
BRQ crashBlind
SETD.0 Usage
SWI osPrintString
INIA 0x0A
OUTA 0x00
INIA 0x01
SWI osExit
; ---- The case the fault screen exists for ----
;
; Bitmap mode has no text rows, so the console draws NOTHING there: a program that faults
; here leaves the system with a message to print and nowhere to print it. Putting the screen
; back into a mode that has characters in it is the difference between a diagnosis and a
; machine that appears to have hung.
crashBlind:
; ---- And with the colours ruined as well ----
;
; A known mode is only half a known screen. This makes the ink of attribute one the same as
; its paper, which is what a program that wrote its own palette can easily leave behind -
; and a message printed into that is perfectly present and completely invisible.
INIA 0d4
OUTA 0xE3
INIA 0x30
OUTA 0xE2
INIA 0x03
OUTA 0xE8 ; Video memory as bank four.
INIA 0d4
OUTA 0xE3
INIA 0xFC
OUTA 0xE4
INIA 0x40
OUTA 0xE5 ; 0xFC40, the two entries attribute one draws from.
RSTA
INIB 0d8
crashBlindWipe:
OUTA 0xE9
DECB
BNB crashBlindWipe ; Both of them black, ink and paper alike.
INIA 0x02
OUTA 0x31
crashOpcode:
0x00 ; Not an instruction, and never will be.
crashService:
SWI 0d40 ; Forty is nobody's.
crashBank:
INIA 0d9 ; Nothing is registered there.
OUTA 0xE0
RSTA
OUTA 0xE1
OUTA 0xE2
INIA 0d1
OUTA 0xE3 ; Into Data Memory.
RSTA
OUTA 0xE4
OUTA 0xE5
OUTA 0xE6
INIA 0d16
OUTA 0xE7
INIA 0x01
OUTA 0xE8 ; Blit, from a bank that is not there.
crashDevice:
INIA 0x02 ; Interrupt me when the console has something to say.
OUTA 0x02
SIF
crashWait:
; Never touches the console, so whatever happens next came from outside.
BRI crashWait
#Data
#Base 0x2000
WordOpcode:
"opcode"
WordService:
"service"
WordBank:
"bank"
WordDevice:
"device"
WordBlind:
"blind"
Usage:
"Crash opcode | service | bank | device | blind"
Argument:
#Reserve 0d16
#Include text.asm
+7 -1
View File
@@ -2258,7 +2258,7 @@ ReservedLeft:
ReservedWalk:
0x00 0x00
ReservedCount:
0d5
0d7
VecHandlerName:
#Reserve 0d23
@@ -2285,6 +2285,12 @@ ReservedNames:
"BankFault"
#Reserve 0d5
0d4
"NoHandler"
#Reserve 0d5
0d5
"NoDevice"
#Reserve 0d6
0d6
ProgPut:
0x00 0x00
+40
View File
@@ -599,8 +599,48 @@ from every assembly file in it. Several are old programs written for the bare ma
| Wander | Goes to the directory it is given and reads a file there by a bare name. The only thing that moves the machine from inside a program, and so the only thing that can check the shell puts the working directory back afterwards. |
| More | A forward-only pager. Space advances a screen, Return one line, and q stops. |
| Press | Says what the console handed it, in hexadecimal and by name. It reads a line and then keys, because the keys that are not characters are dropped in line mode and delivered in key mode, and both halves of that rule want showing. |
| Crash | Breaks on purpose, in whichever of the four ways the system now catches, so that a fault screen can be looked at without having written a bug first. |
| Mode | Forty columns or eighty, whichever the screen is not in. Ten instructions and no data at all, which is the point of it: it is the smallest shape a loadable program can take, and the loader used to stop the machine dead on one. |
### When Something Goes Wrong:
A fault used to stop the machine and print a line to whatever was behind it. On a terminal
that is a diagnosis; behind a window it is a frozen picture and no reason at all, because the
message went to a standard error nobody was looking at. **The machine looked hung and was
not** - it had stopped, and said so somewhere invisible.
CosmOS catches all five faults the machine can raise and says what happened on the screen:
```
> Crash opcode
that byte is not an instruction, at 404E
A 00 B 0F Q 00
the program was stopped
>
```
**A fault ends the program, not the machine.** That is not a compromise. A bare `RETI` from
most faults meets the very instruction that failed and fails again, so carrying on is not on
offer - but the machine is almost never what is broken. Everything the shell puts back when a
program exits, which is the Stack, any vectors it installed, the drive, the working directory,
the console and the screen, is exactly what wants putting back after one dies. So you are
returned to the prompt, and the program is recorded as having stopped rather than finished.
A fault *below* where programs load is the system's own code, and there is nothing to go back
to. That one says so and stops.
**The screen is put back into a mode text can be seen in first**, and that is the part that
matters most rather than the part that is prettiest. A program that faulted in bitmap mode
left the console with no text rows at all, so it draws nothing - the message about what went
wrong would be perfectly correct and completely invisible. Two palette entries are rewritten
for the same reason, since a program that wrote its own colours can leave every ink the same
as every paper. Only the two the message needs are touched; the rest of what the program
chose is left alone.
The address is where it happened, and it is exact. For a missing service or a device with
nobody listening it is the address *after* the instruction, because those two are the faults
where the instruction did dispatch and it was the entry that was empty.
### The Monitor:
The monitor is **part of the shell**, not a program the shell loads, and that is the whole reason it works. A loaded program occupies the one place a loaded program goes, so a monitor that was an application could never look at any other application: loading the thing you wanted to inspect would replace the thing doing the inspecting.
+257
View File
@@ -1260,6 +1260,204 @@ historyAddDone:
STA.1
RET
; ---- When something goes wrong that nothing can carry on past ----
;
; A fault used to stop the machine and print a line to whatever was behind it. On a terminal
; that is a diagnosis; behind a window it is a frozen picture and no reason at all, because
; the message goes to a standard error nobody is looking at. The machine looked hung and was
; not - it had stopped, and said so somewhere invisible.
;
; So the system catches all five and says it on the screen instead.
;
; ---- A fault ends the PROGRAM, not the machine ----
;
; That is the answer to "carry on or start again", and it is not a compromise: a bare RETI
; from most of these meets the very instruction that failed and fails again, so carrying on
; is not on offer. But the machine is almost never what is broken. Everything the shell puts
; back when a program exits - the Stack, the vectors it installed, the drive, the working
; directory, the console, the screen - is exactly what wants putting back after one dies, so
; a fault in a loaded program joins handleExit and you are back at the prompt.
;
; A fault BELOW where programs load is the system's own, and there is nothing to go back to.
; That one says so and stops.
;
; ---- What a handler must not do ----
;
; Fault. There is no double fault rule on this machine: a handler that commits the fault it
; was called about is called again, forever, and each time costs another frame of Stack. So
; nothing below asks for a service, touches a disk, or reaches anything that can refuse.
faultBadOpcode:
SETD.0 FaultOpcode
BRI faultPlain
faultGuard:
SETD.0 FaultGuard
BRI faultPlain
faultBank:
SETD.0 FaultBank
faultPlain:
; The Stack Pointer names the frame, and it has to be taken before anything pushes. Nothing
; above here does: a SETD and a branch move no Stack.
MVSD.3
RSTA
SETD.1 FaultNumbered
STA.1
BRI faultSay
faultNoHandler:
SETD.0 FaultNoHandler
BRI faultNumbered
faultNoDevice:
SETD.0 FaultNoDevice
faultNumbered:
MVSD.3
; These two are the only faults that say WHICH one, and the machine hands that over in Q -
; the one thing a handler here is given in a register. Kept at once, before printing can
; disturb it.
MVQA
SETD.1 FaultNumber
STA.1
INIA 0x01
SETD.1 FaultNumbered
STA.1
faultSay:
; The screen before the words. There is no use saying any of this somewhere it cannot be
; read, and a program that faulted may have left the screen with nowhere to put a letter.
CALL faultScreen
CALL printString
SETD.1 FaultNumbered
LDA.1
BRA faultWhere
SETD.1 FaultNumber
LDA.1
CALL printByteHex
faultWhere:
SETD.0 FaultAt
CALL printString
CALL faultAddress
CALL newLine
; The registers as the frame kept them, which is what they were when it happened.
SETD.0 FaultRegisters
CALL printString
PSHD.3
POPD.0
DPUP.0 0d3
LDA.0
CALL printByteHex
SETD.0 FaultB
CALL printString
PSHD.3
POPD.0
DPUP.0 0d4
LDA.0
CALL printByteHex
SETD.0 FaultQ
CALL printString
PSHD.3
POPD.0
DPUP.0 0d2
LDA.0
CALL printByteHex
CALL newLine
; ---- Whose fault it was ----
;
; Where it happened says which, and one byte of the address decides it: a loaded program
; begins at 0x4000 and everything below that is the system.
PSHD.3
POPD.0
DPUP.0 0d13
LDA.0
INIB 0x40
CCF
SUB
BRC faultInSystem
; A program that will not be carrying on. handleExit does all of the putting back, and
; takes the status the program is deemed to have stopped with in A.
INIA 0x01
SETD.1 FaultStopped
STA.1
INIA 0xFF
BRI handleExit
faultInSystem:
; Nothing to go back to: the shell IS what faulted, and its Stack, its variables and its
; place in its own code are all suspect. Saying so and stopping is the only honest answer,
; and it is a great deal better than the frozen picture this used to be.
SETD.0 FaultSystem
CALL printString
CALL newLine
HALT
; The two bytes of the address in the frame, printed high half first.
faultAddress:
PSHD.3
POPD.0
DPUP.0 0d13
LDA.0
CALL printByteHex
INCD.0
LDA.0
CALL printByteHex
RET
; ---- A screen this can be read on ----
;
; "Put the screen in a known mode" is not tidiness. A program that left the screen in bitmap
; mode left nowhere to draw a character at all - the console draws nothing when there are no
; text rows - so without this, the message about what went wrong is invisible, which is the
; one thing it must never be.
faultScreen:
INIA 0x01
OUTA 0x31 ; Eighty columns of text, whatever was being used.
; And the whole view back to the corner. A scrolled origin or a fraction of a cell puts
; every character somewhere other than where it says it is.
RSTA
OUTA 0x34
OUTA 0x36
OUTA 0x37
OUTA 0x38
; ---- Colours it can be read in ----
;
; A known mode is only half of a known screen: a program that wrote its own palette may
; have left every ink the same as every paper. Attribute one draws in palette entries 16
; and 17, so those two are written and the rest of the program's colours are left alone -
; there is nothing to be gained here by taking away more than is needed.
CALL screenBank
INIA 0d4
OUTA 0xE3
INIA 0xFC
OUTA 0xE4
INIA 0x40
OUTA 0xE5 ; 0xFC40, which is entry sixteen.
RSTA
OUTA 0xE9
OUTA 0xE9
OUTA 0xE9
OUTA 0xE9 ; Black paper.
INIA 0xD0
OUTA 0xE9
INIA 0x40
OUTA 0xE9
INIA 0x38
OUTA 0xE9
RSTA
OUTA 0xE9 ; Red ink, the same red the machine wakes up with.
INIA 0x01
OUTA 0x06 ; And draw in it.
; A console that can be printed to at all: line mode, a cursor, nothing interrupting.
INIA 0x04
OUTA 0x02
RET
; ---- A command that did not work ----
;
; The one place a failure is recorded, so that the thing reading lines out of a file can
@@ -4010,7 +4208,26 @@ exitWorked:
INIA 0x04
OUTA 0x02
; The ink too, and for the same reason as the cursor: a program that chose a colour is not
; around to put it back, and neither is one the fault screen printed for. The shell owns
; the prompt, so the shell is what makes sure it is readable.
RSTA
OUTA 0x06
; ---- Finished, or stopped ----
;
; A program that faulted did not finish, and saying so would be the shell's own word
; against what the fault screen just said in red immediately above it.
SETD.1 FaultStopped
LDA.1
BRA exitFinished
RSTA
STA.1 ; Cleared, so the next program is not blamed for this one.
SETD.0 Stopped
BRI exitSay
exitFinished:
SETD.0 Finished
exitSay:
CALL printString
CALL newLine
BRI prompt
@@ -5259,6 +5476,28 @@ LoadedText:
"loaded, starting at "
NothingLoaded:
"nothing is loaded"
Stopped:
"the program was stopped"
FaultOpcode:
"that byte is not an instruction"
FaultGuard:
"a write into a fenced off part of a bank"
FaultBank:
"a bank that is not there, or an address past its end"
FaultNoHandler:
"nothing is installed at service "
FaultNoDevice:
"nothing is installed for the device on port "
FaultAt:
", at "
FaultRegisters:
" A "
FaultB:
" B "
FaultQ:
" Q "
FaultSystem:
"that was the system itself, so there is nowhere to carry on from. Start the machine again."
Finished:
"finished"
@@ -5682,6 +5921,19 @@ EditWalkBack:
EditWasControl:
0x00
; ---- What the fault screen is saying ----
;
; Whether this cause names an entry as well as itself, and which one. Only the two faults
; about a missing handler do, and for those the machine puts the number in Q.
FaultNumbered:
0x00
FaultNumber:
0x00
; Set when a program is being ended by a fault rather than by asking. handleExit reads it to
; choose its last word, and clears it.
FaultStopped:
0x00
; Whether the line being read is one to remember. The shell's are; a program's are not.
EditKeepHistory:
0x00
@@ -5726,6 +5978,11 @@ CommandLine:
#Vectors
Boot boot
BadOpcode faultBadOpcode
GuardViolation faultGuard
BankFault faultBank
NoHandler faultNoHandler
NoDevice faultNoDevice
osPrintString handlePrintString
osReadLine handleReadLine
osExit handleExit