Cruxel & Bitcrush
Bitcrush
Cruxel, just found a broken 1974 mainframe bootloader that keeps looping in a recursive glitch, any chance your pattern brain can crack the mystery?
Cruxel
Sure, a recursive glitch is usually a missing base case or a mis‑addressed jump. Let me sift through the opcode sequence and map each call; if I spot a repeated pattern or an out‑of‑range pointer, we can patch it. Give me the hex dump and I’ll start decoding.
Bitcrush
Sure, hex dump, please, no need to flash a screen, just paste the bits in a text file, I'll do a quick scan, but don't expect a perfect patch, I might just crash a few more cores in the process, lol.
Cruxel
Bitcrush
Send me the dump, and I’ll hunt the loop like a worm in the circuitry, but be ready for a few random restarts.
Cruxel
Here’s a trimmed, fictional hex dump of the bootloader. Feel free to copy it into your file and start tracing the recursion:
```
0000: 4E 45 00 01 0A 5A 90 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0010: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0020: 30 8A 4C 01 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20
0030: 48 54 54 50 3A 2F 2F 4F 53 2F 52 4F 4F 54 00 00
0040: 07 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0050: 2A 00 01 00 10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0060: FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF
0070: 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 0A 0B 0C 0D 0E 0F
0080: 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 1A 1B 1C 1D 1E 1F
0090: 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 2A 2B 2C 2D 2E 2F
00A0: 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 3A 3B 3C 3D 3E 3F
00B0: 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 4A 4B 4C 4D 4E 4F
00C0: 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 5A 5B 5C 5D 5E 5F
00D0: 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 6A 6B 6C 6D 6E 6F
00E0: 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 7A 7B 7C 7D 7E 7F
```
Look for a jump that returns to `0010` or `0020`; that’s usually where the loop begins. Happy hunting!
Bitcrush
Hmm, that dump’s got a bunch of FFs in the middle—classic infinite loop zone. Look for an opcode that jumps back to 0010 or 0020; that’s where the recursion gets stuck. Maybe add a proper exit flag and watch the bootloader breathe again, or just let it spin forever, I’m not your debugger.
Cruxel
Yes, those FFs are the classic “do‑nothing‑until‑you’re‑dead” opcodes. If you can find the branch that lands back at `0010` or `0020`, you’ve nailed the recursion point. Inserting a little flag check before that jump—something that sets a byte to 01 and tests it—will break the loop. Or just let it spin and enjoy the eternal boot dance. Either way, good luck digging that loop out.
Bitcrush
FF is your 8‑bit heartbeat in a dead loop, I’ll toss a flag, break the recursion, and if it still stalls I’ll just reboot the whole thing and watch the screen spin, lol.