An Assembly-language tutorial is not the same thing as an assembler tutorial - or not usually. Still less usually would it be an interpreter tutorial. But in this case that's what it will turn out to be.
Because in my view there is nothing worse than trying to follow a technical explanation off the bare page, with nothing to Illustrate the logical or arithmetical operations except your own Imagination. I remember trying to learn ASM myself out of a book, and often wondered aloud why there was no tool that could help me understand what I was reading.
Having wondered enough times why such a tool didn't exist, I inevitably took the next step and said: If it doesn't exist, I'll have to invent it - an "assembly-language interpreter". And in some moment like that Ketman was born. Early next year, 2003, the project will be ten years old, and during that time hardly a day has passed that I haven't done some work on it. But it still took five years before V1.0 hit town. I do take my time; I don't cut corners; I don't use the public as beta-testers. When a new version arrives, it's because it's ready.
So forget the idea that this is a novelty toy. It began as a learner's tool for me, but it soon exceeded that specification. It's a real applications programmer's tool. The fact that it is the ideal platform for learning the language is only the first of its benefits. Because you will still be using it long after you have stopped describing yourself as a newbie.
So don't begrudge the small amount of time that this 8086 tutorial spends teaching you how to use the interpreter. It is the interpreter that will teach you assembly language, and it will do that a lot better than I could.
That's why the Ketman 8086 Tutorial comes as an .exe file, TUTOR86.EXE, and not as the usual collection of .txt or html files. The basic .exe is the same .exe that runs all the Ketman clones that are found in the Ketman Maximaster V3.5. That is the professional programmer's package
