how do you write an emulator

[joker]

Hello.

 

First let me start off by saying that this is a great site. Now that the 'fluff' is out of the way...

 

I am new to the world of emulation and I was wondering if anyone knows were I could find some info on how to write my own emulator.

 

I am most interested in developing one for the Sega Genesis.

 

Thanks

[someboddy]

How good are you in programing?

[joker]

How good? Well, thats kinda gettin' a bit personal isn't it? Actually I have a BS in Computer Science.

 

I am looking for a little side project at home, something to tinker with and learn a bit at the same time. What little I could gather is that I may have to mess a bit with some low level stuff which would I would find fascinating.

 

Thanks!!!

[ken_cinder]

First and foremost, you'll need to have a look-see at some technical information for the Sega Genesis, so have a read through the stuff here.

 

Then you might want to head to the Gens website and pickup the SH-2 and 68000 core sources that emulator uses, so you can take a look at them and get an idea of just what's required.

 

2 more emulators that are open source (But not well known and I've never used them) you may want to check out are Generator and Genesis Plus

 

That's all the help I can offer. Good luck.

[SWAMP_THING]

i think the answer is, very carefully making sure u make no mistakes

[someboddy]

I am looking for a little side project at home, something to tinker with and learn a bit at the same time.

 

Emulator should take rom files and run them on a PC. Means you want to write a program, that make code in one language (the console's language) to PC's language. This is like programing a compiler, one of the most difficult thing to program, seccond only to operation system. Definitely not a little side project.

[DreamCastLover]

I suggest you start with something simpler like the Sega Master System and then move on to tougher projects.

[Alpha]

Writing emulators is not exactly a just "oh maybe I can do this" kind of thing. Takes a lot of time and hard work. Not only that your going to need to know a lot more advanced scripting rather than QBasic and that kind of stuff.