MACHINE LANGUAGE MANAGER - Introduction
The Bit Fiddlers, 1981


Congratulations! You have just stepped into the world of Machine Language.  No 
longer are the secrets of fast graphics and infinite program control held out 
of your grasp.

But let's not be hasty!  For along with this new-found flexibility comes 
additional responsibilities and tedious frustrations you may not have 
experienced before.  So, before we get too far along, let me say a few words 
about who this new cartridge is aimed at.

You may have been aware of the efforts of many so-called "hackers" to break the 
bonds of BASIC and to add new and useful hardware and capabilities to the Bally 
Arcade.  It is to these restless explorers that the MACHINE LANGUAGE MANAGER is 
primarily dedicated.

But let me not dissuade the adventuresome who may not yet be familiar with the 
ways and wiles of machine language.  There are a number of books available 
(some even written in English) that can take the uninitiated through the 
conventions used by nearly all microprocessors.  A couple of good references 
are:

1) PROGRAMMING THE Z-80 by Rodnay Zaks 
2) Z-80 SOFTWARE GOURMET GUIDE COOKBOOK PUBLISHED by SCELBI

Personally, I use THE Z-80 HANDBOOK by ZILOG, mainly because they have an 
alphabetical and numeric listing of all the instructions and op-codes for the 
Z-80 in the back.  For more specific information on the Bally Arcade, I 
strongly recommend the BALLY ON-BOARD ROM SUBROUTINES manual available from the 
ARCADIAN newsletter. Of even more utility was the on-board ROM description 
[SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE FOR THE BALLY ARCADE - A TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION] by Dave 
Nutting Associates (143 pages worth, with the complete source listing thrown in 
on top), also available from the ARCADIAN. A lot of information used in 
creating the MLM was taken from the latter of these two publications.

For those who wish to jump in without the aid of the aforementioned references, 
the next chapter holds a brief discussion of the conventions used throughout 
the rest of this manual.