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MEMBLOCKS

Note: the following description of how MemBlocks works is very confusing. Sorry!
Tip: You'll understand it better if you know computer stuff, i.e. bits and addresses


MemBlocks is a mod that will allow you to store redstone signals (bits) within a series of data blocks. The mod adds two new blocks to the game - Data/Address blocks and Controller blocks.

To use the mod, you set out 8, 16 or 32 data blocks in a row, and stick two controller blocks on each end.
The first controller block you put down will turn into a write block, and the other one will turn into a read block. The controller blocks are only placeable if there are exactly 8, 16 or 32 data blocks - otherwise it won't be placed. You can also put down another controller block on either end and it will turn into a wipe/erase block.

For simplicity, we'll give an example of how to use it with the 8 set of data blocks first.

In each set of 8 data blocks, 4 of them are actual storage for redstone bits, and the other 4 are "address" blocks. What address blocks allow you to do is have many "sets" of the 4 data blocks.

For example, think of the set of 8 blocks as a car parking lot: each floor of the parking lot contains 4 parking spaces - this is representative of each bit; you can either have a car there, or no car (1 and 0 respectively). The address blocks of this carpark is representative to the elevator used to access each floor. When the address set by the address blocks is set to 0, you are on the ground floor, and can access 4 parking spaces, or 4 bits. When you set the address blocks to 1 however, you access another, DIFFERENT 4 bits of space.
Thus, the address blocks allow you to store to 16 sets of 4 bits. (16 comes from 2 ^ 4 address blocks). 16 sets of 4 bits is already 64 bits - 64 bits of redstone data in only 8 blocks, or 8 bytes.

Now, there are also 16 and 32 long sets available. The 16 set allows 8 data blocks and 8 address blocks, so it can allow up to 256 bytes, and the 32 set can store up to 128 KILObytes. THAT'S 1048576 REDSTONE BITS IN ONLY 32 BLOCKS!!!

To ACTUALLY use this mod, just send a redstone signals to the data and address blocks you want, then send a redstone signal to the write block. This will then write the redstone data to the block. To read it later, just send a redstone signal to the read block, and it'll call back the redstone signals and output it to any redstone connected to the data blocks. To call back data on different addresses, just change the address to whatever you want and then prompt the read block. Sending a signal to the erase block will erase all data in the set. Don't press this accidentally (which is why this block isn't compulsory)!



Estimated time of release: a few days, just fixing bugs and making sure it all works properly.

If there's any confusion in the explanation of the mod, just send me a PM and i'll try to explain it better.



~anonymous-thing
Wasteland Software