1: Background 1

System Programming ()
Main goal:
What is a system
software?
Compiler
Assembler
Loader and Linker
Debugger

To design and
implementation of
system software.

Book content:
Background (SIC & SIC/XE)
Assemblers
Loaders and Linkers
Macro Processors
Compilers
Operating Systems
Other system software
Software Engineering Issues

1: Background 2
Chapter I: Background
Chapter goal:
To familiar with a pseudo
machines: SIC (SIC/XE)
SIC
(Simplified Instructional
Computer)
SIC/XE
(XE stands for extra
equipment)

Overview:
The SIC

SIC machine architecture
SIC programming examples

SIC/XE machine architecture
SIC/XE programming
examples


Machine dependency
1: Background 3
Why using SIC machine?
Most system software differs from application
software is machine dependency.
System software are usually related to the architecture
of the machine on which they are to run.

SIC is a hypothetical computer that has been carefully
designed to include the hardware features most often
found on real machine.
The SIC machine
1: Background 4
Memory
8-bit bytes
Word: 24 bits (three consecutive bytes)
Registers
Each register is 24 bits in length.
The SIC machine architecture
1: Background 5
Data formats



Addressing modes.





The SIC machine architecture (cont.)
1: Background 6
Instruction set
Load and store registers (LDA, LDX, STA, STX, etc.)
Integer arithmetic operations (ADD, SUB, MUL, DIV)
Compare the value in register A with a word
in memory (COMP)
Conditional jump instructions (JLT, JEQ, JGT)

For detailed see Appendix A

Input and Output
Test device (TD), Read data (RD), Write data (WD)




The SIC machine architecture (cont.)
1: Background 7
Data movement


The SIC programming examples
1: Background 8
Arithmetic operations


The SIC programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 9
Looping and indexing operations


The SIC programming examples (cont.)
MOVECH
STR1
STR2
ZERO
ELEVEN
1: Background 10
Indexing and looping operations


The SIC programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 11
Input and output operations


The SIC programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 12
Subroutine call and record input operations


The SIC programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 13
Memory
The same as that previously described for SIC.
Maximum memory available on a SIC/XE system is
1MB.
Registers
The SIC/XE machine architecture
1: Background 14
Data formats (48-bit floating point)
f*2^(e-1024)

Instruction formats and addressing modes
e=0 means Format 3 ; e=1 means Format 4
i=0, n=0 means SIC machine (for upward compatible)
i=1, n=0 means immediate addressing
i=0, n=1 means indirect addressing
i=1, n=1 means simple addressing




The SIC/XE machine architecture (cont.)
1: Background 15
1: Background 16
1: Background 17
Instruction set
SIC/XE provides all of the instructions that are available on
the standard versions.
It also provides instructions to perform floating-point
arithmetic operations (ADDF, SUBF, MULF, DIVF..)
Register-to-register arithmetic operations (ADDR,
SUBR,)
Input and Output
SIO (start I/O channel), TIO (test I/O channel) and HIO (halt
I/O channel)




The SIC/XE machine architecture (cont.)
1: Background 18
Data movement


The SIC/XE programming examples
1: Background 19
Data movement


Compared the SIC with SIC/XE
1: Background 20
Arithmetic operations


The SIC/XE programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 21
Looping and indexing operations


The SIC/XE programming examples (cont.)
MOVECH
STR1
STR2
1: Background 22
Indexing and looping operations


The SIC/XE programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 23
Subroutine call and record input operations


The SIC/XE programming examples (cont.)
1: Background 24
CISC: Complex Instruction Set Computers machine.
relatively large and complicated instruction set.
several different instruction formats and length
many different addressing modes.

E.g., VAX, Pentium

The implementation of such an architecture in
hardware tends to be complex.
CISC vs. RISC
1: Background 25
Introduced by Digital Equipment Corporation
(DEC) in 1978.
Memory
All addresses used are byte addresses.
2 bytes forms a word, 4 bytes forms a longword
8 bytes forms a quadword, 16 bytes forms a octaword
Registers
16 general-purpose register. (R15: program counter,
R14: stack pointer, R13: frame pointer, R12: argument
pointer)

The VAX architecture (CISC)
1: Background 26
RISC: Reduced Instruction Set Computers machine
Standard, fixed instruction length
Single-cycle execution of most instructions
Relatively large number of general-purpose registers
Relatively small number of machine instructions
Relatively small number of instruction formats and
addressing modes.

E.g., UltraSPARC, PowerPC, Cray T3E

The implementation of such an architecture in
hardware tends to be simple.

CISC vs. RISC
1: Background 27
Introduced by Sun Microsystem in 1995.
Memory
All addresses used are byte addresses.
2 bytes forms a halfword, 4 bytes forms a word
Registers
A large register file (more than 100 general-purpose
register)
Fixed instruction length

The UltraSPARC architecture (RISC)