Revised December 11, 2013

CS 230: Introduction to Computers and Computer Systems

General description

This course introduces hardware and software concepts used in computer systems. Specific topics include machine-level programming, memory organization, and the compilation cycle.

Logistics

Audience

• 2nd-year students with an interest in Computer Science
• Not open to Computer Science students

Normally available

• Winter, Spring

Related courses

• Predecessors: One of CS 116, 136, 138, 146, not open to Computer Science students
• Successors: CS 338, CS 436
• Conflicts: CS 241, CS 251

For official details, see the UW calendar.

Software/hardware used

• Linux, MIPS Simulator

Typical reference(s) - not required but available online as an additional resource

• D. Patterson, J. Hennessy, Computer Organization and Design, 2020

Required preparation

At the start of the course, students should be able to

• Follow programs written using imperative control flow
• Write simple imperative programs using lists, iteration, and array indexing for both read and write (mutable memory model)
• Use basic algebra, calculus, and probability (for performance analysis)

Learning objectives

At the end of the course, students should be able to

• Work with basic logic gates to form circuits Write short machine- and assembly-language programs to perform simple data manipulation
• Describe data representations used by computer hardware at the bit level, operate on these representations, and compute their values
• Explain some simple processor implementation optimization techniques, in particular pipelining, and how differences in code ordering can impact performance for processors using these optimizations
• Compare basic memory and I/O architectures and how they can impact performance
• Understand the basic compilation steps

Typical syllabus

Introduction (1 hour)

Data representation and arithmetic (9 hours)

• Binary representation of integers, bit operations
• Logic gates and circuits
• Other representations: ASCII, UTF8, strings, floating point

Assembly language (10 hours)

• Fundamental operation and components of a computer
• Registers vs. memory / control flow / indirection
• Build process, declarations, assembler directives
• Stacks, subroutines, arrays

Basic processor design (5 hours)

• Datapath, pipelining, hazards

Memory and I/O devices (5 hours)

• Caching and virtual memory
• Secondary storage
• I/O mechanisms: programming, interrupt, DMA, parallel vs. serial, etc.

Build and Execute (6 hours)

• DFAs, NFAs, RE
• Context Free Grammars
• Parsing
• Assembler: opcodes and symbol table
• Linker: import/export symbols, relocation
• Compiler: control flow & arithmetic expressions