On: How to fit a large program into a small machine (1980)

[klelatti]

I was surprised to find that a VM was used in the Busicom calculator that was the motivation for and first use of the Intel 4004 microprocessor.

Wrote about it here:

https://thechipletter.substack.com/p/bytecode-and-the-busico...

[FullyFunctional → klelatti]

Thanks, that was an incredible story and much more detail than I had seen elsewhere. The whole series is a goldmine. Eg. I never knew that the registers in the 4004 were dynamic (ie. a cap + 1 transistor) [1]!

[1] https://thechipletter.substack.com/p/the-strangeness-of-the-...

[klelatti → FullyFunctional]

Thanks so much! It's a really interesting design.