# floooh/chips

8-bit chip and system emulators in standalone C headers

Repository: https://github.com/floooh/chips
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/chips
Language: C
License: Zlib
License Family: permissive
Last push: 2026-08-14T08:05:04+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 76/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 97, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3213, "days_push": 19, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1278, forks 95 (observed 2026-08-28T04:04:13.495974+00:00)

## What it is
A toolbox of 8-bit chip and complete system emulators written as dependency-free C99 header files. Chip emulators communicate via a pin bit-mask tick interface so whole computers can be emulated by wiring chips together like on a breadboard.

## Use cases
- emulate 8-bit CPUs and support chips in my own project
- build a complete retro computer emulator from individual chip emulators
- embed a lightweight emulator in a game or app via C headers
- compile emulators to WebAssembly to run in the browser
- understand how 8-bit hardware works by simulating chips at the pin level

## When to choose
- you need dependency-free, embeddable C emulator code
- you want cycle-level chip emulation with a clean pin-based API
- you target multiple compilers and platforms including WASM

## When to avoid
- you need high-level turnkey emulators with UI and ROM management
- you emulate modern 16/32/64-bit systems
- you prefer emulator frameworks with plugin ecosystems

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: active
- function: simulation, embedded
- domain: simulation, hardware, gaming-tools, developer-tools
- platform: cross-platform, wasm, cpp
- tags: emulation, 8-bit, retro-computing, single-header, c99, cpu-emulator, chip-emulator, zlib-license

## Member repositories
- floooh/chips (main) score 76

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:13.495974+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T05:02:45.405313+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/floooh/chips (fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:13.495974+00:00, sha 04a2a96ab406)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.