MARS Features

This is the overview feature description -- see also new features in each release.

MARS features:

• GUI with point-and-click control and integrated editor. The three icons shown here denote "run", "single-step", and "single-step backwards."

• Integrated editor, featuring multiple file-editing tabs, context-sensitive input, and color-coded assembly syntax. All assembly files in a directory (folder) may be assembled into a single executable.

• Easy set/removal of breakpoints using check boxes

• Easily editable register and memory values, similar to a speadsheet

• Display values in hexadecimal or decimal

• Command line mode for instructors to test and evaluate many programs easily. Command-line arguments to specify registers and memory locations to be displayed after the program run, to examine for correct contents. Set up a "batch" to do many programs in succession.

• Floating point registers, coprocessor1 and coprocessor0

• Variable-speed execution

• "Tool" utility for MIPS control of simulated devices (new in 2.1). A tool is a program running on a separate thread with access to MARS data. An assembly program can run in MARS and interact with the tool through memory-mapped IO. Any imaginable pseudo-device can be interfaced to MIPS assembly code, or extended to physical devices or hardware.