The latest articles on DEV Community by xelvoridze (@xelvoridze). https://dev.to/xelvoridze https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=90,height=90,fit=cover,gravity=auto,format=auto/https:%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F4047446%2F0272c6e0-4997-4679-882d-7988e19aec7f.png https://dev.to/xelvoridze en xelvoridze Sun, 26 Jul 2026 02:16:24 +0000 https://dev.to/xelvoridze/built-a-custom-virtual-machine-from-scratch-in-rust-nc2 https://dev.to/xelvoridze/built-a-custom-virtual-machine-from-scratch-in-rust-nc2 <p>A few weeks ago I started working on <strong>XVM</strong> - a custom virtual machine built entirely from scratch in Rust. Not an emulator of any real processor (not x86, not ARM) - a completely custom architecture I designed myself, in the same spirit as educational VMs like CHIP-8.</p> <p>It has its own CPU with 8 registers, 33 instructions, a built-in step-by-step debugger with breakpoints, typed error handling instead of panics, and video memory with a live window you can draw pixels to directly from assembly code.</p> <p>I also built a small IntelliJ/RustRover plugin that adds syntax highlighting and a custom icon for <code>.xasm</code> files, since I wanted the editing experience to feel like a real language.</p> <p>Screenshots, full instruction list, and setup instructions are in the repos:</p> <ul> <li>XVM: <a href="https://github.com/xelvoridze/xvm" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://github.com/xelvoridze/xvm</a> </li> <li>XASM plugin: <a href="https://github.com/xelvoridze/xasm-plugin" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://github.com/xelvoridze/xasm-plugin</a> </li> </ul> <p>Would love any feedback, especially on the instruction set design and error handling - this is my first real Rust project and I'm still learning a lot along the way.</p> rust showdev beginners programming