RetroChallenge 2018: CHIP-8 in CλaSH

29 August 2018 (programming haskell fpga electronics retrochallenge retro clash chip-8)

The 2018 September run of the RetroChallenge starts in a couple of days, and I've been playing around with CλaSH for the last couple of weeks, so I thought I'd aim for the stars and try to make a CHIP-8 computer.

What is CλaSH?

CλaSH is, basically, an alternative GHC backend that emits a hardware description from Haskell code. In the more established Lava family of HDLs, like Kansas Lava that I've used earlier, you write Haskell code which uses the Lava eDSL to describe your hardware, then you run said Haskell code and it emits VHDL or Verilog. With CλaSH, you write Haskell code which you then compile to VHDL/Verilog. This allows you to e.g. use algebraic data types with pattern matching, and it will compile to just the right bit width.

Here is an example of CλaSH code by yours truly: the receiver half of a UART.

What is CHIP-8?

There is no shortage of information about the CHIP-8 on the Internet; the Wikipedia page is a good starting point. But basically, it is a VM spec from the mid-'70s; originally meant to be run on home computers built around the the 8-bit COSMAC CPU. There are tens, TENS! of games written for it.

CHIP-8 has 35 opcodes, a one-note beeper, 64x32 1-bit framebuffer graphics that is accessible only via an XOR bit blitting operation (somewhat misleadingly called "sprites"), and 16-key input in a 4x4 keypad layout.

I have some experience with CHIP-8 already: it was the first computer I've implemented on an FPGA (in Kansas Lava back then); I've used it as the test application when I was working on Rust for AVR; I even have a super-barebones 2048 game for the platform.

In summary, CHIP-8 is so simple that it is a very good starting point when getting accustomed with any new way of making computers, be it emulators, electronics boards or FPGAs.

My plan

I want to build an FPGA implementation of CHIP-8 on the Papilio Pro board I have laying around. It is based on the Xilinx Spartan-6 FPGA, a chip so outdated that the last version of Xilinx's development tools that supports it is ISE 14.7 from 2013; but it is what I have so it will have to do. I plan to work outside-in by first doing the IO bits: a VGA signal generator for the video output, and a PS/2 keyboard controller for the input. Afterwards, I will move to making a CPU which uses CHIP-8 as its machine language.

If I can finish all that with time remaining, there are some "stretch goals" as well: implementing sound output (the Papilio IO board has a 1-bit PWM DAC that I could use for that); interfacing with a real 4x4 keypad instead of a full PS/2 keyboard; and implementing some way of switching ROM images without rebuilding the FPGA bitfile.