Stephen A. Edwards Columbia University Crown
CSEE W3827
Fundamentals of Computer Systems
Spring 2012

Lectures

Class meets Mondays and Wednesdays, 1:10 - 2:25 PM in 614 Schermerhorn Hall.

Staff

Name Email Office hours Location
Mailing list for questions csee3827-staff@lists.cs.columbia.edu
Prof. Stephen A. Edwards sedwards@cs.columbia.edu 3-4 Monday, 11-12 Thursday 462 CSB
Prof. Martha A. Kim martha@cs.columbia.edu 10-11 Monday, 12-1 Wednesday 469 CSB
RJ Barker rjb2150@columbia.edu 3-5 Sunday TA Room, Mudd
Gouri Dongaonkar gpd2115@columbia.edu 6-8 Tuesday, 10:30-11:30 Wednesday TA Room, Mudd
Yoonji Shin ys2476@columbia.edu 9:30-11:30 Sunday Sky Lounge, 10th Fl., Hartley Hall
Lisa Wu lisa@cs.columbia.edu 9:30-11:30 Thursday 468 CSB

Overview

This course examines how the 1s and 0s that form the foundation of digital computing are organized, structured, and manipulated to produce full-fledged computer systems. In bridging this gap, the course will cover many subjects beginning with binary logic, combinatorial and sequential circuit design, memory structures, instruction set architectures, and, ultimately, basic processor design.

Prerequisites

An introductory programming course, such as COMS 1004 or 1007. You need to understand the basics of imperative, sequential programming to understand the assembly language programming we will discuss.

Schedule

Date Lecture Notes Reading Due
Jan 18 Representing Numbers
pdf
1.4
Jan 23 Boolean Logic
pdf
1.5,2.1-2.7
Jan 25
Jan 30 Combinational Logic
pdf
2.8,2.9,5.2
Feb 1
Feb 6 Sequential Logic
pdf
3.1-3.3,3.5
pdf HW 1
pdf solutions
Feb 8
Feb 13 Finite State Machines
pdf
3.4
Feb 15 Transistors, Gates, and ICs
pdf
1.7
pdf HW 2
pdf solutions
Feb 20 Memory Elements
pdf
5.5
Feb 22
Feb 27 Datapath and Control
pdf

pdf HW 3
pdf solutions
Feb 29
Mar 5 Midterm Review
pdf

Mar 7 Midterm Exam
Mar 12-16 Spring Break
Mar 19 The MIPS Instruction Set
pdf
6.1-6.7
Mar 21
Mar 26
Mar 28
Apr 2 MIPS Microarchitecture
pdf
7.1-7.3
HW 4, solutions
Apr 4 A Multicycle MIPS Processor
pdf
7.4
Apr 9 Pipelining MIPS
pdf
7.5
Apr 11
Apr 16 Caches
pdf

Apr 18 pdf HW 5
pdf solutions
Apr 23 Advanced Microarchitectures
pdf

Apr 25 Microarchitecture of Modern Primary Memory Systems

Apr 30 Final Review
pdf

pdf HW 6
pdf solutions
May 7 (1:10-4pm SCH 614) Final

X86 Resources

Required Text

David Harris and Sarah Harris.
Digital Design and Computer Architecture.
Morgan-Kaufmann, 2007.

A perfect fit for our class, half of this book is devoted to classical digital logic design; the other half to processor architecture centered on the practical, but teachable, MIPS processor.

Cover of Digital Design and Computer Architecture

Homework

Grading

40% Homeworks
30% Midterm
30% Final

Academic Honesty Policy

You may discuss homework problems with your classmates, but you must write up your solution independently and understand it. Students turning in copied homeworks will be referred to the dean. See the Columbia CS department academic policies for more details.

Other

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