I’ve just released version 0.8 of WordGrinder, my minimal word processor for writing first drafts. This started life as a bugfix release but I got a bit carried away with the feature requests, and there’s a tonne of new quality-of-life improvements.

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Two years ago (really? Two years?) I did some writeups on performing arithmetic on the 6502 and Z80 processors in the context of my Cowgol compiler. Well, I'm now working on a code generator for the 6303, so it's time for another one!

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I’ve just released a proper working version of Cowgol 2.0, a brand new version of my small language for small systems. Better type checking! Better syntax! Better code generation! Better compilation speed! And, ironically, this was mostly achieved by drastically simplifying it and reducing functionality…

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Good news! After literally years of (very on and off work), I've just release Cowgol 2.0, my very small language for very small systems! It's simpler, smaller, less complex, and is better in every way.

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It’s winter, which means it’s time for my yearly holiday somewhere really bleak and miserable. This time it’s Colonsay, a small island in the Inner Hebrides off the west coast of Scotland. I rented a small cottage and spent a very pleasant week there hiding from the storms in front of the solid fuel stove, and here are the photos.

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A while back I picked up an old Canon Typestar IV portable typewriter in a junk shop: this is one of a class of electronic typewriter known as the ‘thermal wedgie’: battery powered, printing via a thermal print head to either heat sensitive paper or with a special ribbon, they’re light, small and extremely quiet. Mine will run off rechargeable batteries. Unfortunately the ribbons are impossible to find and is it’s not valuable and I have no need for one anyway, I’ve ripped the guts out and crudely turned it into what’s turned out to be a really rather nice USB keyboard — the keyswitches are excellent.

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For years now I have had another science fiction novel tucked away in the corner of my hard drive, which has been taken out and occasionally polished a bit more before being put away again. I’ve decided that it’s now time to call it done and kick it out into the outside world, so you can now go and read Child of the Sea and the Stars on my website.

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