The assembler accepts the following options:
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Usage: ca65 [options] file
Short options:
-D name[=value] Define a symbol
-I dir Set an include directory search path
-U Mark unresolved symbols as import
-V Print the assembler version
-W n Set warning level n
-d Debug mode
-g Add debug info to object file
-h Help (this text)
-i Ignore case of symbols
-l name Create a listing file if assembly was ok
-mm model Set the memory model
-o name Name the output file
-s Enable smart mode
-t sys Set the target system
-v Increase verbosity
Long options:
--auto-import Mark unresolved symbols as import
--bin-include-dir dir Set a search path for binary includes
--cpu type Set cpu type
--create-dep name Create a make dependency file
--create-full-dep name Create a full make dependency file
--debug Debug mode
--debug-info Add debug info to object file
--feature name Set an emulation feature
--forget-inc-paths Forget include search paths
--help Help (this text)
--ignore-case Ignore case of symbols
--include-dir dir Set an include directory search path
--large-alignment Don't warn about large alignments
--listing name Create a listing file if assembly was ok
--list-bytes n Maximum number of bytes per listing line
--macpack-dir dir Set a macro package directory
--memory-model model Set the memory model
--pagelength n Set the page length for the listing
--relax-checks Relax some checks (see docs)
--smart Enable smart mode
--target sys Set the target system
--verbose Increase verbosity
--version Print the assembler version
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Here is a description of all the command line options:
--bin-include-dir dir
Name a directory which is searched for binary include files. The option may be used more than once to specify more than one directory to search. The current directory is always searched first before considering any additional directories. See also the section about search paths.
--cpu type
Set the default for the CPU type. The option takes a parameter, which may be one of
6502, 65SC02, 65C02, 65816, sunplus, sweet16, HuC6280
The sunplus cpu is not available in the freeware version, because the instruction set is "proprietary and confidential".
--create-dep name
Tells the assembler to generate a file containing the dependency list for the assembled module in makefile syntax. The output is written to a file with the given name. The output does not include files passed via debug information to the assembler.
--create-full-dep name
Tells the assembler to generate a file containing the dependency list for the assembled module in makefile syntax. The output is written to a file with the given name. The output does include files passed via debug information to the assembler.
-d, --debug
Enables debug mode, something that should not be needed for mere mortals:-)
--feature name
Enable an emulation feature. This is identical as using .FEATURE
in the source with two exceptions: Feature names must be lower case, and
each feature must be specified by using an extra --feature
option,
comma separated lists are not allowed.
See the discussion of the
.FEATURE
command for a list of emulation features.
--forget-inc-paths
Forget the builtin include paths. This is most useful when building customized assembler modules, in which case the standard header files should be ignored.
-g, --debug-info
When this option (or the equivalent control command .DEBUGINFO
) is
used, the assembler will add a section to the object file that contains
all symbols (including local ones) together with the symbol values and
source file positions. The linker will put these additional symbols into
the VICE label file, so even local symbols can be seen in the VICE
monitor.
-h, --help
Print the short option summary shown above.
-i, --ignore-case
This option makes the assembler case insensitive on identifiers and labels.
This option will override the default, but may itself be overridden by the
.CASE
control command.
-l name, --listing name
Generate an assembler listing with the given name. A listing file will never be generated in case of assembly errors.
--large-alignment
Disable warnings about a large combined alignment. See the discussion of the
.ALIGN
directive for futher information.
--list-bytes n
Set the maximum number of bytes printed in the listing for one line of
input. See the
.LISTBYTES
directive
for more information. The value zero can be used to encode an unlimited
number of printed bytes.
--macpack-dir dir
This options allows to specify a directory containing macro files that are
used instead of the builtin images when a
.MACPACK
directive is encountered. If --macpack-dir
was specified, a .mac
extension is added to the package name and
the resulting file is loaded from the given directory. This is most useful
when debugging the builtin macro packages.
-mm model, --memory-model model
Define the default memory model. Possible model specifiers are near, far and huge.
-o name
The default output name is the name of the input file with the extension replaced by ".o". If you don't like that, you may give another name with the -o option. The output file will be placed in the same directory as the source file, or, if -o is given, the full path in this name is used.
--pagelength n
sets the length of a listing page in lines. See the
.PAGELENGTH
directive for more information.
--relax-checks
Relax some checks done by the assembler. This will allow code that is an error in most cases and flagged as such by the assembler, but can be valid in special situations.
Examples are:
-s, --smart-mode
In smart mode (enabled by -s or the
.SMART
pseudo instruction) the assembler will track usage of the REP
and
SEP
instructions in 65816 mode and update the operand sizes
accordingly. If the operand of such an instruction cannot be evaluated by
the assembler (for example, because the operand is an imported symbol), a
warning is issued.
Beware: Since the assembler cannot trace the execution flow this may lead to false results in some cases. If in doubt, use the .ixx and .axx instructions to tell the assembler about the current settings. Smart mode is off by default.
-t sys, --target sys
Set the target system. This will enable translation of character strings and character constants into the character set of the target platform. The default for the target system is "none", which means that no translation will take place. The assembler supports the same target systems as the compiler, see there for a list.
Depending on the target, the default CPU type is also set. This can be
overriden by using the
--cpu
option.
-v, --verbose
Increase the assembler verbosity. Usually only needed for debugging purposes. You may use this option more than one time for even more verbose output.
-D
This option allows you to define symbols on the command line. Without a value, the symbol is defined with the value zero. When giving a value, you may use the '$' prefix for hexadecimal symbols. Please note that for some operating systems, '$' has a special meaning, so you may have to quote the expression.
-I dir, --include-dir dir
Name a directory which is searched for include files. The option may be used more than once to specify more than one directory to search. The current directory is always searched first before considering any additional directories. See also the section about search paths.
-U, --auto-import
Mark symbols that are not defined in the sources as imported symbols. This
should be used with care since it delays error messages about typos and such
until the linker is run. The compiler uses the equivalent of this switch
(
.AUTOIMPORT
) to enable auto imported
symbols for the runtime library. However, the compiler is supposed to
generate code that runs through the assembler without problems, something
which is not always true for assembler programmers.
-V, --version
Print the version number of the assembler. If you send any suggestions or bugfixes, please include the version number.
-Wn
Set the warning level for the assembler. Using -W2 the assembler will even warn about such things like unused imported symbols. The default warning level is 1, and it would probably be silly to set it to something lower.