Assembler Directives

ASSUME
DB - Defined Byte.
DD - Defined Double Word
DQ - Defined Quad Word
DT - Define Ten Bytes
DW - Define Word
ASSUME Directive:
The ASSUME directive is used to tell the assembler that the name of the logical segment
should be used for a specified segment. The 8086 works directly with only 4 physical segments: a
Code segment, a data segment, a stack segment, and an extra segment.
Example:
ASUME CS:CODE ; This tells the assembler that the logical segment named CODE
contains the instruction statements for the program and should be treated as a code segment.
ASUME DS:DATA ; This tells the assembler that for any instruction which refers to a
data in the data segment, data will found in the logical segment DATA.
DB: DB directive is used to declare a byte-type variable or to store a byte in memory location.
Example:
1. PRICE DB 49h, 98h, 29h ; Declare an array of 3 bytes,
; named as PRICE and initialize.
2. NAME DB ‘ABCDEF’ ; Declare an array of 6 bytes and
; initialize with ASCII code for letters
3. TEMP DB 100 DUP(?) ; Set 100 bytes of storage in memory and give it the name as TEMP,
but leave the 100 bytes uninitialized. Program instructions will load values into these locations.
DW: The DW directive is used to define a variable of type word or to reserve storage location of
type word in memory.
Example:
MULTIPLIER DW 437Ah ; this declares a variable of type word and named it as
MULTIPLIER. This variable is initialized with the value 437Ah when it is loaded into memory to
run.
EXP1 DW 1234h, 3456h, 5678h ; this declares an array of 3 words and initialized with specified
values.
STOR1 DW 100 DUP(0); Reserve an array of 100 words of memory and initialize all words
with 0000.Array is named as STOR1.
END: END directive is placed after the last statement of a program to tell the assembler that this
is the end of the program module. The assembler will ignore any statement after an END
directive. Carriage return is required after the END directive.
ENDP: ENDP directive is used along with the name of the procedure to indicate the end of a
procedure to the assembler
Example:
SQUARE_NUM PROCE ; It start the procedure
; Some steps to find the square root of a number
SQUARE_NUM ENDP ; Hear it is the End for the procedure
END - End Program
ENDP - End Procedure
ENDS - End Segment
EQU - Equate
EVEN - Align on Even Memory Address
EXTRN
ENDS - This ENDS directive is used with name of the segment to indicate the end of that logic
segment.
Example:
CODE SEGMENT ; Hear it Start the logic ; segment containing code
; Some instructions statements to perform ; the
logical operation
CODE ENDS ; End of segment named as ; CODE
EQU: This EQU directive is used to give a name to some value or to a symbol. Each time the
assembler finds the name in the program, it will replace the name with the value or symbol you
given to that name.
Example:
FACTOR EQU 03H ; you has to write this statement at the starting of your program and later in
the program you can use this as follows
ADD AL, FACTOR ; When it codes this instruction the assembler will code it as ADDAL, 03H
; The advantage of using EQU in this manner is, if FACTOR is used many no of times in a
program and you want to change the value, all you had to do is change the EQU statement at
beginning, it will changes the rest of all.
EVEN: This EVEN directive instructs the assembler to increment the location of the counter to
the next even address if it is not already in the even address. If the word is at even address 8086
can read a memory in 1 bus cycle.
If the word starts at an odd address, the 8086 will take 2 bus cycles to get the data. A
series of words can be read much more quickly if they are at even address. When EVEN is used
the location counter will simply incremented to next address and NOP instruction is inserted in
that incremented location.
Example:
DATA1 SEGMENT
; Location counter will point to 0009 after assembler reads
; next statement
SALES DB 9 DUP(?) ; declare an array of 9 bytes
EVEN ; increment location counter to 000AH
RECORD DW 100 DUP( 0 ) ; Array of 100 words will start from an even address for quicker
read
DATA1 ENDS
GROUP - Group Related Segments
LABLE
NAME
OFFSET
ORG - Originate
GROUP - The GROUP directive is used to group the logical segments named after the directive
into one logical group segment.
INCLUDE - This INCLUDE directive is used to insert a block of source code from the named
file into the current source module.
PROC - Procedure
PTR - Pointer
PUBLC
SEGMENT
SHORT
TYPE
PROC: The PROC directive is used to identify the start of a procedure. The term near or far is
used to specify the type of the procedure.
Example:
SMART PROC FAR ; This identifies that the start of a procedure named as SMART and
instructs the assembler that the procedure is far.
SMART ENDP
This PROC is used with ENDP to indicate the break of the procedure.
PTR: This PTR operator is used to assign a specific type of a variable or to a label.
Example:
INC [BX] ; this instruction will not know whether to increment the byte pointed to by BX or a
word pointed to by BX.
INC BYTE PTR [BX] ; increment the byte ; pointed to by BX
This PTR operator can also be used to override the declared type of variable. If we want to access
the a byte in an array WORDS DW 437Ah, 0B97h,
MOV AL, BYTE PTR WORDS
PUBLIC - The PUBLIC directive is used to instruct the assembler that a specified name or label
will be accessed from other modules.
Example:
PUBLIC DIVISOR, DIVIDEND; these two variables are public so these are available to all
modules.
If an instruction in a module refers to a variable in another assembly module, we can access that
module by declaring as EXTRN directive.
TYPE - TYPE operator instructs the assembler to determine the type of a variable and
determines the number of bytes specified to that variable.
Example:
Byte type variable – assembler will give a value 1
Word type variable – assembler will give a value 2
Double word type variable – assembler will give a value 4
ADD BX, TYPE WORD_ ARRAY; hear we want to increment BX to point to next word in
an array of words.
DOS Function Calls􀂾AH 00H : Terminate a Program
AH 01H : Read the Keyboard
AH 02H : Write to a Standard Output Device
AH 08H : Read a Standard Input without Echo
AH 09H : Display a Character String
AH 0AH : Buffered keyboard Input
INT 21H : Call DOS Function.