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Objectives | Staff&Contact Information | Where&When | Textbook | Grading | Policies | Schedule&Assignments
What this course is about
The goal of CS 2011 is to provide students with
knowledge about the structure and behavior of digital
computers at several levels of abstraction, and to give
students experience in solving problems using an assembly
language. Recommended background and course topics are listed
in the
WPI undergraduate catalog course description
Instructor: Glynis Hamel (GH)
Teaching Assistants: Yumeng Qiu (YQ), Yutao Wang (YW)
| Day/Time | 10:00 | 11:00 | 12:00 | 1:00 | 2:00 | 3:00 | 4:00 | 5:00 |
| Monday | GH (FL 132) | YW( FL A22) | YW (FL A22) | |||||
| Tuesday | YQ (FL A22) | YQ (FL A22) | GH (FL 132) | |||||
| Wednesday | YQ (FL A22) | YQ (FL A22) | YW (FL A22) | YW (FL A22) | ||||
| Thursday | ||||||||
| Friday | GH (FL 132) |
If you have a question regarding your grades in the course, please send email to cs2011-staff *at* cs.wpi.edu. Mail sent to this address goes to the instructor and to the TAs. Include your section number in all correspondence.
The instructor's email address is ghamel *at* cs.wpi.edu. Please restrict your use of my personal email address to issues of a confidential nature. You will get a quicker response if you post your questions to the class discussion board.
| Section | Time | Location |
| B01 | 9 - 9:50am | KH 202 |
| B02 | 10-10:50am | KH 202 |
The first lab is scheduled for Wednesday, November 9 (there are no labs on Oct 26 and Nov 2).
Textbook, Software, and Authors' Website
Textbook (required): Patt, Yale N., and Sanjay J. Patel, Introduction to Computing Systems: From
Bits & Gates to C & Beyond,
2nd edition, McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2003. A copy of the textbook is on
reserve at the library. If you buy a used textbook, make sure you buy
the 2nd edition.
(recommended) Bryant, Randal E., and David R. O'Hallaron, Computer Systems: A Programmer's Perspective, Second Edition, Prentice-Hall, 2010. Also on reserve at the library.
Software: We will be using the LC-3 simulator, which can be downloaded from the authors' website.
Exams are closed-book, closed-notes. You may bring in one sheet of notes (one paper, 8.5" x 11.5", both sides) to each exam. You may not use any computers, calculators, cellphones, or other electronic devices during the exams.
There are no makeups for exams. Absence from an exam will be excused only for medical or emergency reasons. A note from your doctor or from the Office of Academic Advising will be required. In such cases your final grade will be recorded as Incomplete and you will be allowed to take a makeup exam the next time the course is offered.
Several times during the term we will take a few minutes of class time for in-class group work. This will consist of one or two questions related to recently-covered lecture material or homework problems. Each assignment will be graded as either credit (1) or no credit (0). At the end of the term, five of these assignments will be chosen at random by the instructor, and these will count as 5% of your final grade. There are no makeups for in-class assignments.
Academic Honesty Policy
Please read WPI's Academic
Honesty Policy.
If you receive general help from another student or an outside source, that student or source must be acknowledged in the documentation accompanying your submitted work.
Cheating will not be tolerated. If you are unsure whether a given activity would constitute cheating, ask the instructor. Violations of the Academic Honesty Policy can result in an NR for the course, and violators will be subject to the procedures outlined in section 5 of the WPI Judicial Policy.
Schedule
Note: the instructor reserves the right to change the order of topics
or the dates of the exams, if necessary.
| Week | Reading | Topics | Assignments, Extra Notes
|
| Oct 25 - 28 | Chapters 1, 2 (Patt) Chapter 2 (Bryant) |
Course overview
Numbering systems Representations of unsigned and signed integers Integer arithmetic and overflow Floating point representations Floating point operations |
Lecture 1 objectives
Lecture 2 objectives Lecture 3 objectives Homework 1 (due: Tuesday, 11/1) |
| Oct 31 - Nov 4 | Chapter 3 (Patt)
Section 4.2 (Bryant) Chapter 6 (Bryant) read this! (skim section 6.1) |
Boolean Logic and logic gates
Combinational circuits Circuit equivalence Clocks Sequential circuits Memory organization Performance improvements I - cache |
Lecture 4 objectives
Lecture 5 objectives Lecture 6 objectives Lecture 7 objectives Sequential circuit animation Homework 2 (due: Tuesday, 11/8) |
| Nov 7 - 11 | Chapter 4, 5 (Patt) |
Machine state
Instruction execution cycle Machine code instructions Microarchitecture of the LC-3 LC-3 ISA - operate instructions LC-3 ISA - data movement instructions Addressing modes LC-3 ISA - control instructions |
Lecture 8 objectives
Lecture 9 objectives Lecture 10 objectives Lecture 11 objectives Lab 1, Wed 11/9 Homework 3(due: Tuesday, November 15) |
| Nov 14 - 18 | Chapter 6, 7.1 - 7.2 (Patt)
Section 4.4 (Bryant) read this! |
LC-3 ISA - control instructions, cont. Performance improvements II - pipelining High-level constructs Assembly Language and pseudo-ops |
Lecture 12 objectives Lecture 13 objectives Lecture 14 - Exam 1, Thursday, November 17 Lecture 15 objectives Sample Exam 1 (pdf file) Homework 4(due: Tuesday, Nov 22) Lab 2, Wed 11/16 |
| Nov 21 - 22 | Chapter 7.3 - 7.4, 8.1 - 8.4 (Patt) |
Subroutines
Device-level I/O Polling |
Lecture 16 objectives Lecture 17 objectives Happy Thanksgiving! Homework 5 (due: Thursday, 12/1) |
| Nov 28 - Dec 2 | Chapter 9, 10, 14.3 (Patt)
Chapter 7 (Bryant) |
Trap routines
The assembly process External assembly, linking Stack Parameter Passing Binary-to-ASCII |
Lecture 18
objectives
Lecture 19 objectives Lecture 20 objectives Lecture 21 objectives Program used to illustrate trap processing Recursion - example Lab 3 Wed, November 30 |
| Dec 6 - 10 | Chapter 8.5, Appendix B (Patt)
Sections 3.1 - 3.7 (Bryant) |
Introduction to interrupts
Interrupt processing Intel 8088 processor Intel 8088 addressing Intel 8088 instruction set |
Lecture 22 objectives Lecture 23 objectives Lecture 24 objectives Lecture 25 objectives Homework 6 (due: Tuesday, 12/13) Lab 4 Wednesday, Dec 7 |
| Dec 12 - 15 | Appendix B (Patt) | Intel 8088 stack, activation records |
Lecture 26 objectives Lecture 27 - Exam review/catch up Lab 5(Wednesday, December 14) Lecture 28 - Exam 2, Thursday, December 15 Sample Exam 2 (pdf) |

http://www.cs.wpi.edu/~cs2011/b11/index.html