IAT 267 Lecture Notes - Instruction Set, High-Level Programming Language, Microarchitecture
18 Aug 2013
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Can drive a car without knowing how the internal combustion engine works. It is important to understand the components and how they work together. It"s not either/or, both are components of a system. Computer-based systems can also be embedded systems (hidden microcontroller) Microprocessor-a cpu (computer processing unit) on a single ic (integrated circuit) Sensor-a device that measures a physical quality and converts it into a signal which can be read by an observer or by an instrument. E. g. temperature sensor, touch sensor, force sensor, light sensor. Actuator-a mechanical device for moving or controlling a mechanism or system. All computer systems are characterized by two general principles: universal computing device-all computers, given enough time and memory, are capable of computing exactly the same things. In theory, a computer can compute anything that"s possible to commute. In practice, solving problems involves computing under constraints. E. g. abacus: transformation between layers-translate any given problem into a solution.
