MACHINE INDEPENDENT FEATURES OF ASSEMBLER

The assembler features that are not closely related to machine architecture
are ,

1. Literals

2. Symbol defining statement

3. Expressions

4. Program blocks

5. Control section

1. LITERALS

Literal is a constant operand which is used to write the value of it as a part of

the instruction. This avoids having to define the constant elsewhere in the program
and make up a label for it.

Literal is defined using the notation *= constant value.

Definition of literals:

*=C’EOF’

*=X’05’

*=X’F1’

*  Indicate the current value of the location counter. For example,

in *= C’EOF’ , the string constant EOF (internal machine representation in
binary) is generated and stored in the current memory location address.
The notation, = constant value used for literals varies from one assembler to
another but most assembler use symbol = to make literal identification easier

*= constant value  object code internal representation of constant value

*=C’EOF’  454F46 in hexadecimal ASCII

Usage of literals

Opcode = constant value

Examples are:

LDA = C’EOF’

TD = X’05’

TD=X’F1’

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LITERAL &IMMEDIATE ADDRESSING

With immediate addressing, the operand value is assembled as part of the

machine instruction

Eg: LDA #3 011003

With literal, the assembler generates specified value as a constant at some

other memory location .the address of this generated constant is used as target
address for the machine instruction

Eg : 0030 LDA = X’3’

0033

0059 *=X’3’

LITERAL POOL:

All the operands used in the program are gathered together into one or more
literal pools.

Normally literals are placed into a pool at the end of the program

In some cases it is desirable to place literals into a pool at some other

location in the object program using the directive LTORG (LITERAL ORIGIN).
 When the assembler encounters the LTORG statement, it creates a literal
pool that contains all of the literals operands used since the previous LTORG or
the beginning of the program

Literals placed by LTORG will not be repeated at the pool at the end of the
program .The duplicated literals are recognized by comparing the generated value
of the constant operands

Eg: usage of literals LDA = C’EOF’

LDA = X’454F46’

: object code

Definition of literals *= C’EOF’ 454F46

*=C’454F46’ 454F46

• Literals can be used to refer to the current value of the location counter
(address of the memory location)

Eg : base *

LDB =*

• The above instructions are used to specify the operand with value as current
value of location counter.
2. SYMBOL DEFINING STATEMENT:

Symbol can be defined in two ways

• using RESW and RESB directives

• using EQU directives

SYMBOL DEFINED USING RESW OR RESB DIRECTIVES:

Memory location is allocated for the symbols which are defined using
RESW or RESB directives.

During pass1, the address of the memory location is stored as value in the
symbol table.

LOC opcode operand

0030 RETADR RESW

SYMTAB

SYMBOL NAME VALUE

RETADR
0030

MAXLEN 1000
SYMBOL DEFINED USING EQU DIRECTIVE:

LOC SYMBOL EQU VALUE

1000 MAXLEN EQU BUFFER-BUFEND

• Memory location is not allocated for the symbol defined using EQU

The value of the symbol can be any one of the following:

constant any expression involving constant address of previously

defined symbol

• During pass1, the name of the symbol and the value assigned to the symbol
are stored in the symbol table.

Eg : LOC symbol opcode operand

0 A EQU 0

1 X EQU 1

2 L EQU 2

ORG:

ORG is an assembler directive that can be used to indirectly assign to

symbols.

Format:
 ORG value

Where value is a constant or an expression involving constants and

previously defined symbols.

When this statement is encountered during assembly of a program, the

assembler resets its location counter (LOCCTR) to the specified value. Since
the values of symbols used as labels from LOCCTR, the ORG statement will
affect the values of all labels defined until the next ORG.

For example, if the symbol table is defined in the following structure:

STAB 100 entries

SYMBOL VALUE FLAGS

In this table, the SYMBOL field contains a 6 byte user defined symbol. VALUE is
a one word representation of the value assigned to the symbol. FLAGS is a 2 byte
field that specifies symbol type and other information.

We could reserve space for this table with the statement

STAB RESB 1100

The fields SYMBOL, VALUE, FLAGS are defined individually with the help of
EQU statement.
SYMBOL EQU STAB

VALUE EQU STAB+6 without using ORG

FLAGS EQU STAB+9

The same symbol definition can be accomplished using ORG.

STAB RESB 1100

ORG STAB

SYMBOL RESB 6

VALUE RESB 1 using ORG

FLAGS RESB 2

ORG STAB+1100

The descriptions of the EQU and ORG statements contain restrictions that
are common to all symbol defining assembler directives. In the case of
EQU, all symbols used on the right hand side of the statement must have
been defined previously in the program. Thus the sequence,

ALPHA RESW 1

BETA EQU ALPHA would be allowed.

Whereas, the sequence

BETA EQU ALPHA

ALPHA RESW 1 would not.

 The reason for this is the symbol definition process. In the second example
above, BETA cannot be assigned a value when it is encountered during
PASS1 of the assembly because ALPHA does not yet have a value.
However, our TWO PASS assembler design requires that all symbols be
defined during PASS1.

3. EXPRESSIONS:

Assembler allow arithmetic expression format according to the normal

rules using the operator +,-,*,&,/

Individual terms in the expression may be

 Constant

 User defined symbols

 Special terms

Special term is the current value of the location counter (designated

by *) . This term represents the value of the next unsigned memory location.

For example ,

BUFEND EQU *

gives BUFEND a value that is the address of the next byte after the buffer area.

TYPES OF EXPRESSION

• Absolute expression

• Relative expression

ABSOLUTE EXPRESSION
 Value of the expression is independent of the beginning address of the
program.

Absolute expression may contain only absolute terms or relative terms but it
must produce the absolute value

Eg: absolute expression that contains the relative terms { relative term represent
some location within the program}

MAXLEN EQU BUFEND-BUFFER

Relative format

But produce the absolute value 1000 which is the length of buffer

RELATIVE EXPRESSION:

The value of relative expression is dependent of starting address of the

program.

It may contains relative terms or absolute terms but it must produce the
value which is relative to the starting address of the program

Eg: SYMBOL EQU STAB

VALUE EQU STAB+6  1000+6=1006

FLAGS EQU STAB+9  1000+9=1009

The values of the expression is 1006 which is some memory location within
the program and also relative to the beginning address of the program.

To determine the type of an expression we must keep track of the types of

all symbols defined in the program. For their purpose we need a flag in the symbol
table to indicate type of value (absolute or relative) in addition to the value itself.