B261 Systems Architecture

Basic Information

Lecturer

The course teacher is Chris Clack

Aims

This course will introduce the fundamental concepts of computer systems architecture, and the hardware and software issues that underly this. The aim is to introduce students to the basics of computer architecture and programming of computers at the assembly language level. The course covers computer design, instruction formats, number representations, input-output and support of high-level programming language constructs in assembly language. The MIPS assembler is studied in detail.

Objectives

By the end of this course students should have a good understanding of the following features of modern computer systems, including, for example:

The digital logic systems from which all computers are constructed.
The structure of a computer: computer architecture.
Memory systems and memory management.
Stored program model, including instruction sets and addressing modes.
The relationship to input/output devices such as disks, files, printers, and graphics devices.
Multi-tasking and users.
Future trends and directions.