simple introduction to 6.004

An Introduction to the digital world

1. Computer program —— Virtual machine
2. Computer systems(Operating Systems,Virtual memory,I/0)——Instruction set + memory
3. Computer architecture(Processors,caches,pipeline)——digital circuit
4. Digital design(combinational and sequential circuits)——bits,logic gates
5. Devices Materials Atoms

Our Focus

Programable General-purpose processors

1. Microprocessors are the basic building block of computer systems
2. Microprocessors are the most sophisticated digital systems that exists today

Course Outline

1. Assembly lauguage:from high-level computer languages to the language of computer
2. Digital Design:combinational and sequential circuits
3. Computer Architecture:Simple and pipelined processors,Caches and the Memory hierarchy
4. Computer System:Operating system and virtual memory,Parallelism and synchronization

Tools

We rely on modern design tools

1. We will use RISC-V,a simple and modern insturction set
2. We will design hardware using Minispec,a new hardware description language built for 6.004(Based on bluespec,but heavily simplified)