Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: Paul_Holman@Playstation.sony.com Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english Subject: Re: Yaroze Charts Needed? Date: 22 Aug 1997 12:48:56 GMT Organization: PlayStation Net Yaroze (SCEE) Lines: 72 Message-ID: <5tk1rp$3qt7@chuka.playstation.co.uk> Reply-To: Paul_Holman@Playstation.sony.com NNTP-Posting-Host: chuka.playstation.co.uk To: news@playstation.co.uk cc: gil@snsys.com Originator: news@chuka.playstation.co.uk Again, my comments with PH> Prefix. (Damn and Blast Lotus notes for not doing this automatically) From: gil@snsys.com (Gil Jaysmith) Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english The libraries shipped with the pro devkit number about 15 or so and cover all areas of the PSX including the memory card and the gun and stuff like that. The Yaroze library appears to be most of the functions rolled up into one library, and hardwired into memory at a particular place to save you having to worry about linker scripts and that sort of thing, which can save you lots of space if you pay attention to them. The Yaroze libraries don't contain the GTE functions which are what give the PSX 360K polygons a second rather than 60K or thereabouts. I guess they might not include the gun code and stuff like that too. PH> However, remember that all the Gs* libps is actually written in assembler PH> with direct calls to the GTE itself, and has been tuned over several PH> years... PH> PH> So we've heard of programmers who've found that using Gs* calls PH> has been more efficient than they're own assembler. PH> This discussion is probably more suited to the "professional" PH> newsgroups.... PH> PH> (FYI: writing support for the Namco Gun is easy with Yaroze libraries, PH> its the "add-on" required for the Konami Gun that is not). You can code for the PSX in assembler, C, or C++ (bearing in mind that assembler is tortuous and C++ has no standard library in the way C does so you can't rely on the C++ equivalent of functions like string handling - but the C versions work fine, obviously). There isn't any difference in the final result, just in the effort it takes. All three versions can call the libraries. And yes, Sony does insist that you use the library functions, which has sometimes presented problems, as developers are fond of game speed, and you couldn't accuse earlier versions of the libraries of being all that quick. However, as part of Sony's QA for a game, the game's usage of library functions is assessed, and if you're quite patently not using any libraries, Sony will want to know (a) why not ("they're crap" is generally not an excuse) and (b) what you're using instead - since you aren't supposed to disassemble the libraries to write your own optimal versions. This task used to be performed by some black monolith of a machine of which there were three in the world, or something like that, but is now much easier thanks to the Performance Analyser. This is available to developers as a debug and tuning aid, but it also conveniently provides much handier stats about library usage at the Sony end. PH> Again, there are probably better forums for this discussion. PH> PH> Also, its easy to point out how many good games have been PH> written using the standard libraries..... and the bugs that have PH> been picked up when people tried to drift off course.... PH> Gil Jaysmith SN Systems Software Ltd, makers of Psy-Q... http://www.snsys.com Disclaimer: What I say when I post here represents me, not my employers.