The process or contains some amount of local storage known as the Register

• A process has registers and the ALU
• Registers are where you store values that are currently being worked on
• The values stored in the registers are sent to the alu to be added, subtracted, etc.. the result is stored back in the register

Memory

• Modeled in continuous space
• Every byte in the memory is associated with an index, called the address
• We can read and write in the memory
• Give the address to the memory hardware, we can read the content in that byte
• Given the address and a byte value, we can modify the content in the memory at that address

Program and Data

• consists of instructions and data, both stored in memory
• Instructions in binary

Machine Code

• It is binary!
• The instruction set constitutes the vocabulary of the machine. These are the words understood by the machine itself
• To work on the machine we need a translator To see more about translation visit [[Program Translation]]

Why learn Assembly Language?

• Knowing assembly illuminates concepts not only in computer organization but operating systems, compilers, parallel systems, etc.
• Understanding high-level constructs are implemented leads to more effective use of those structures.
  • Control constructs (if, do-while, etc)
  • Pointers
  • Parameter Passing

MIPS is a RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) instruction set, meaning that it has simple and few instructions

• Originated in the early 1980's
• An acronym for Microprocessor without Interlocked Pipeline Stages

RISC Philosophy-

• fixed instruction lengths
• load-store instruction sets
• limited number of addressing modes
• limited number of operations

The Four ISA Design Principles

Simplicity favors regularity

• Consistent instruction size, instruction formats, data formats
• Erases implementation by simplifying hardware Smaller is Faster
• Fewer bits to access and modify
• Use the register file instead of slower memory Make the common case fast
• Small constants are common, thus small intermediate fields should be used Good design demands good compromises
• Compromise with special formats for important exceptions
• A long jump (beyond a small constant)